BDB Pitmans is throwing its entire weight into finding mid-market US firms to join its soon-to-be-launched international network, Broadfield. The Lawyer understands there is space in the proposed network for multiple US firms with BDB Pitmans managing partner John Hutchinson describing the UK and US as “starting points” for its grand plan. The firm announced […]
Bird & Bird CEO Christian Bartsch has said that he “would not say no” to the idea of a US merger after revealing that the firm broke through the £500m mark for the first time in its history. Bartsch was speaking as the firm published its financial results for the 2023/24 year. Though a US […]
Mishcon takes on HSBC’s high-net-worth arm for BVI investment client HSBC Private Bank – the arm reserved for high-net-worth individuals – was hit by a part 7 provision of financial services claim in the Commercial Court on Friday 19 July. The claim, which seeks monetary damages from the defendant, has been brought by Mishcon de […]
TLT’s latest recruits bring the firm’s future energy team to 120 lawyers – with some familiar faces rejoining in time for the next phase of growth.
BDB Pitmans partners have voted through proposals that will see the firm transition to a CMS-style network model, having called off merger talks with Womble Bond Dickinson in 2023. The firm has signed a letter of intent with Alvarez & Marsal Legal Services (AMLS) to help internationalise the business. Both BDB Pitmans and AMLS issued […]
Making partner can be stressful, full of uncertainty and unmet promises. Walker Morris’s new formal scheme hopes to change that.
Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton has prepared the groundwork for its first $20m partner lateral hire, if it “can find that special person”, The Lawyer can reveal. The move comes as Cleary looks to build on an unprecedented growth spurt in the City over the past few years, which has seen partner headcount increase by […]
Litigation boutique Candey has opened an office in the British Virgin Islands (BVI), marking the firm’s crossover into the offshore legal market. The firm is among a handful of firms that practise both BVI law and English law, with several of its lawyers already able to practise there, including partner Lisa Walmisley and BVI legal […]
Iberian firm Uría Menéndez will close in New York when its Park Avenue lease expires, after more than three decades in the US. The firm runs with a small staff in New York of just three lawyers, led by office managing partner and corporate lawyer José Félix Zaldivar. Uría Menéndez felt its US strategy would […]
Fieldfisher has promoted 10 lawyers to partner in its 2024 promotions round, eight of whom have been made up in London. The London promotions, effective from 1 April, comprise four women. This includes private client lawyer Alice Vink, banking and finance director Anna Crosby, clinical negligence director Helen Thompson and Shaheen Mosquera, who specialises in […]
Welcome to The Passport, your regular round-up of the most important stories to come from the European legal market. In this edition, we look at how CMS zoomed past Dentons in the Polish lawyer headcount stakes; why you might have to get used to the idea of three firms with ‘Snellman’ in their name; and […]
The French legal market has welcomed a new boutique this week as CGR Avocats opens its doors following the breakup of its predecessor firm earlier this year. European 100 firm LPA-CGR Avocats finally split in May, bringing an end to the seven-year partnership between Lefèvre Pelletier & Associés and CGR Legal. CGR Avocats relaunched at […]
A turbulent election and the upcoming Paris Olympics: there’s plenty of eyes on France this summer. As its people gear up to celebrate la Fête Nationale Française, Bastille Day, this Sunday, we turn our attention to Bredin Prat and the French disputes market. The market: With a seat of the Unified Patents Court (UPC) and […]
Mayer Brown has followed hotly on Paul Hastings’ heels to strengthen significantly in Paris, hiring 30 lawyers from a local firm. The Lawyer understands that Mayer Brown is hiring two-thirds of the total lawyer headcount at French firm Ayache to bolster its transactional team in the French capital. Altogether, The Lawyer understands that seven Ayache corporate/M&A […]
Bird & Bird has announced it will be opening a new office in Tokyo with the hire of Ashurst partner Hiro Iwamura. The primary purpose of the office will be to support the firm’s Japanese clients in the renewable energy, life sciences and technology space with outbound work across Europe, the Middle East and Asia […]
European giant Kinstellar has gained a foothold in the Southeast Asian legal after securing a joint-venture deal with Vietnamese firm Asia Counsel. Asia Counsel boasts a headcount of just 21 lawyers, including four partners. Its focus has been on assisting foreign multinationals and Vietnamese corporations with expansion, M&A and financial matters. Acting independently for the […]
Pogust Goodhead has launched an office in Sydney with a warning to Australian corporations that the firm is “ready to hold them to account”. The claimant law firm, which specialises in social and environmental mass claims, has hired Sydney litigation boutique Crichton & Co’s two partners, Amie Crichton and Joshua Carton. It is also looking […]
Online reservation provider Agoda has hired Asos’s former legal chief Anna Suchopar as its general counsel. Suchopar has made the move from ASOS, where she held the role of general counsel and company secretary from 2019. She will take over from Tom Thomas and the new role is based in Bangkok. She will report into […]
There was some significant Indian market news this week from Linklaters. It named Singapore-based capital markets partner Amit Singh as its new India chief, replacing London-based Narayan Iyer. Singh, who arrived as a lateral from magic circle rival Allen & Overy in 2018, is already the head of the capital markets practice in South and […]
Winston & Strawn is the latest firm preparing to close its office in Hong Kong, though its joint venture in the region will continue. The Lawyer understands the office will close after Chinese New Year. The firm has nine lawyers in Hong Kong, with four of them being partners. The firm will continue to operate […]
Linklaters has opened up about a cyclone that forced its Hong Kong office to shut down for a day, as it becomes the first magic circle firm to publish its climate-related financial disclosure report. As of 6 April 2022, limited liability partnerships must now provide a climate-related financial disclosures report within their annual report on […]
Expansion of Allen & Overy’s cybersecurity team continues beyond London with the hire of two Norton Rose Fulbright partners in Australia. Anna Gamvros and Ross Phillipson are moving to A&O, which currently has offices in Perth and Sydney. Gamvros leaves Norton Rose having headed the firm’s information governance, privacy and cybersecurity practice for the Asia […]
Linklaters has kicked off a redundancy round due to the economic slowdown in China, axing 30 roles across its three offices in the region. The Lawyer understands that the affected lawyers sit within the equity and debt capital markets, corporate and banking teams across the firm’s Beijing, Shanghai and Hong Kong offices. A spokesperson for […]
DAC Beachcroft has formed an association with an independent Singapore firm that had previously worked in tandem with Ince’s international network. DACB has teamed up with Incisive Law, a local firm that was known up until earlier this year as Ince Singapore. Incisive Law had been allied with Ince since 2011, but it cut ties […]
The publication of the Rules for Registration and Regulation of Foreign Lawyers and Foreign Law Firms in India 2022 by the Bar Council of India (BCI) in March 2023 – potentially opening up the Indian legal market to foreign lawyers – led to a lot of excited chatter around the legal world. These Rules came […]
Every gambler knows that the secret to survivin’, is knowing what to throw away and knowing what to keep. Kenny Rogers’ appreciation of the subtleties of risk works as a helpful way into this Horizon. Dentons’ very public divorce from its Chinese arm Dacheng was conveyed to clients this week following long internal deliberations and some […]
Dentons will launch in Uganda through a tie-up with Kampala Associated Advocates.
White & Case is opening an office in Cairo after announcing an association with new Egyptian law firm MHR & Partners.
East Africa’s M&A market has grown in recent years as dealmakers flock to the region to get a slice of growing business and lawyers are starting to follow. A number of multinationals have been making major bids from African nations over the last 18 months.
Places such as London and Singapore are still the main hubs for international arbitration but Nigeria has been attempting to raise its status in the past few years
Increasing profit in the face of protectionism isn’t a bad approach
French firm Gide Loyrette Nouel is set to launch an office in Egypt’s capital city Cairo, its second expansion in the Middle East in four months. Gide’s Cairo office will open in the first quarter of 2018 and the latest expansion is headed by partner Baudouin de Moucheron.
Norton Rose Fulbright TMT partner Dino Wilkinson has joined Clyde & Co to boost firm’s Abu Dhabi office.
DWF’s proposed Saudi launch comes just days after Clifford Chance closed its local office in favour of an alliance. 1 March: DWF opens Dubai office in first overseas expansion 30 June: DWF eyes Europe and Qatar for next launch
DWF is considering opening its first office in Qatar and additional offices across Europe as part of its latest plan to boost its international presence.
Taylor Wessing has boosted its presence in the Middle East after forming an alliance with Saudi Arabia-based Alsulaim Alawaji & Partners Law Firm.
Payne Hicks Beach construction and energy head Julian Critchlow will leave the firm on 1 June to set up his own practice focusing on Middle Eastern and East African legal work. The new firm will be called Al Bawardi Critchlow and is established in association with UAE firm Al Bawardi Advocates. It will be based […]
Central Asian-based Colibri Law has become the second international firm to enter the Iranian legal market after opening its doors in Tehran. The Iran team will focus on corporate work including joint venture agreements, merger control issues, and trade and regulatory issues. The firm is also looking to specialise in advising foreign firms looking to […]
Former GFH Capital general counsel David Haigh has been acquitted in Dubai over charges relating to alleged ‘Twitter abuse’ and will return to the UK.
Vinson & Elkins has become the latest firm to close in Abu Dhabi, with all staff set to relocate to its Dubai office. All staff in Abu Dhabi, including partner Rob Patterson, will move to Dubai from the end of March, with the firm continuing to have offices in both Dubai and Riyadh. The decision […]
White & Case has announced it has established a new association in Saudi Arabia with the Law Firm of AlSalloum and AlToaimi. Earlier this week The Lawyer revealed that White & Case had ended its five-year association with Waleed Al-Nuwaiser. The relationship came to an end in December and although the firm was known to […]
White & Case has ended its Saudi Arabian association with Waleed Al-Nuwaiser after five years. The US firm partnered with Al-Nuwaiser after Latham & Watkins poached its former associated partner Mohammed Al-Sheikh, but the alliance broke down late last year, The Lawyer can reveal. At the time Latham also picked up partner Christopher Langdon and the majority of […]
Global business is increasingly familiar with the prospect of short-notice public investigatory attention, whether from regulators, law enforcement, political forces or as a consequence of sanctions, and this can – in in some cases – devastate individual and corporate reputation.
Despite the fact that the threat of an investigation alone can be enough to paralyse a business, early warning signs are often missed and businesses can mistake an investigation risk for a reputation risk. Those who handle serious issues well are able to triage the issue at an early stage and identify its potential impact, […]
Analysis of recent fines suggests that environmental prosecutions are resulting in more substantial fines, especially for ‘very large organisations’.
On September 22, 2021, the Quebec government adopted Bill 64, An Act to modernize legislative provisions as regards the protection of personal information, enacting significant changes to the requirements governing the use and protection of personal information under various statutes, including notably the Act respecting the protection of personal information in the private sector and the Act respecting Access to documents held by public bodies and the Protection of personal information.
The Data Protection Authority in Hungary (Nemzeti Adatvédelmi és Információszabadság Hatóság), recently published its annual report which included details of a fine of €670,000 (HUF 250,000,000) being imposed on a bank. To date, this fine is the highest imposed by the Hungarian Authority.
Environmental, social and governance factors (ESG) alongside sustainability are hot topics in business right now. Employees are increasingly scrutinising what employers are doing to promote sustainability, not least in the benefits they offer.