A&O dispatches top man to Hong Kong to shore up energy practice

Oil and gas partner Paul Griffin, who joined A&O from Herbert Smith in November 2010 and has been working in the sector for more than 25 years, will move to Hong Kong in November.

Only Griffin is being ­relocated, but it is a long-term commitment and he expects that more lawyers will follow.

According to Griffin, A&O was mulling sending him to Singapore before ­settling on Hong Kong as the best place to leverage the firm’s energy practice across Asia.

“We already have a strong energy practice in Asia Pacific, particularly in Perth, which is one of the oil and gas centres, but we’re also strong in Northern Asia,” he said. “My move is about building on that strong practice and pulling it all together through the rest of Asia Pacific and also ­horizontally, through India and the former Soviet republics.”

A&O first opened in Hong Kong in 1988.