Ropes & Gray to launch training scheme in nascent London office

The office’s existing business plan focuses on growth via lateral hires but joint managing partner Mike Goetz told Lawyer2B.com that trainee solicitor recruitment was also a high priority.

“Business is going great so the future is looking quite rosy for us. And because we’ve grown fairly substantially in a fairy short period of time we think graduate recruitment should be our next step. We would hope to have something in place from next summer,” explained Goetz.

Any future recruitment programme is expected to target undergraduates as well as Legal Practice Course students and is likely to offer a similar benefits package available at other US firms.

Ropes & Gray’s London office was launched in late October 2009 by Goetz and fellow joint managing partner Maurice Allen, who both joined from magic circle firm Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer. Their move to the firm took the legal market by surprise as they were widely expected to join newly launched Greenberg Traurig Maher, as exclusively revealed by Lawyer2B.com’s sister title TheLawyer.com on 22 October (read more).

The office now boasts six partners and 17 associates and focuses mainly on finance and restructuring work.