Hengeler Mueller is one of the most traditional law firms among the top 10 European law firms, and in its current form was formed when Düsseldorf law firm Hengeler Kurth Wirtz and Frankfurt law firm Mueller Weitzel Weisner merged. Hengeler Mueller remains a conservative firm focused on top-end work. It hires rarely and loses partners rarely, although several groups of younger lawyers have in the past quit to set up boutiques. The firm is Slaughter and May’s German best friend
Hengeler Mueller is one of the most traditional law firms among the top 10 European law firms, and in its current form was formed when Düsseldorf law firm Hengeler Kurth Wirtz and Frankfurt law firm Mueller Weitzel Weisner merged.
Hengeler Mueller remains a conservative firm focused on top-end work. It hires rarely and loses partners rarely, although several groups of younger lawyers have in the past quit to set up boutiques.
The firm is Slaughter and May’s German best friend and has been closely linked to the ‘best friends’ group for years. It does have a small number of foreign offices, most recently launching in Shanghai in 2013 to add to representative bases in Brussels and London.
Hengeler Mueller is predominantly a corporate law firm although it also has smaller, but strong, finance, private equity and capital markets teams.
Hengeler Mueller has one of Europe’s longest pure locksteps at 12 years, with no plans to move away from the structure. It has been making efforts to increase its female partner numbers in recent years but the number of women in the partnership remains woefully low at under 10 per cent, although eight female partners now is substantially better than just three in 2013.
Like several German law firms Hengeler Mueller has two managing partners who share the role of firm management with fee-earning. The current duo, Georg Frowein and Rainer Krause, were elected in 2018.
They replaced finance partner Dirk Bliesener and corporate partner Georg Seyfarth, who served a four-year term between 2014 and 2018.
