RPC taps Wragges for three-strong senior corporate team

The pair is set to join RPC in London early next year alongside fellow Wragges corporate partner David Marshall.

Haywood, Wragges’ relationship partner for Amec, Bupa, Origin Enterprises, Premier Foods and Shepherd Group, was managing partner of the firm between May 2003 and December 2005 and focuses on the food and drink sector.

The former corporate practice head led for Premier Foods last year on the £182m sale of its canned grocery operations to Princes, which the firm described as its first corporate instruction from the company.

Marshall, a private equity specialist, joined Wragges from Travers Smith in 2010, having worked at Wragges earlier in his career as a newly qualified lawyer.

The trio will join RPC’s existing seven-partner, 30-lawyer corporate team covering London and Hong Kong.

RPC corporate head Tim Anderson said in a statement: “They’re the perfect fit with RPC - genuine teamworkers of the highest calibre. They focus on long-term relationships and provide a fresh, distinctive and unfussy approach to getting mid- and upper mid-market deals done across Europe for large corporates and private equity houses.

“Both our corporate team and the firm as a whole have made enormous progress in recent years. Together with Richard, Maurice and David, we can take things to another level.”

Wragges senior partner Quentin Poole commented: “Richard, Maurice and David are all great partners as well as good personal friends – we’ll be sorry to lose them. But this is an exciting opportunity for them – RPC is a firm we know well and very much respect. We wish them all the best for the future.”