Americas
The announced dissolution of Heenan Blaikie is significant on many levels. It is, as widely reported, the biggest collapse in the history of Canada’s legal market. It may point to severely limited restructuring options for other large law firms that see their profits dwindle. Moreover, it has flooded the Canadian legal market with professionals in many different practice areas looking for a new platform.
One of the firms to benefit is MCCARTHY TÉTRAULT, which picked up Frederico Marques, a Brazilian-qualified lawyer who acts as a foreign legal consultant in Canada. Before joining Heenan, Marques worked as in-house counsel for Brazilian industry leaders Vale, Brasil Telecom, and Odebrecht, applying his expertise in M&A, joint ventures, and financing transactions in the mining and infrastructure sectors. Associate Steven Molnar accompanied him to McCarthy Tétrault.
Another beneficiary of Heenan’s collapse is BORDEN LADNER GERVAIS, which gained Subrata Bhattacharjee, co-chair of the national trade and competition group at the insolvent firm. Bhattacharjee, who specializes in merger clearance issues, cartel investigations, and foreign investment law, comes to his new firm as national vice chair of its competition and foreign investment review group. Meanwhile, DENTONS welcomed corporate and commercial lawyer Michael Ledgett, who advises lenders, developers, agencies, and governments in cross-border M&A and PPP (public-private partnership) projects. The Heenan story was still breaking news as of presstime; there will doubtless be many more hires in the weeks to come.
In New York, HOGAN LOVELLS expanded its corporate transactional practice with the hiring of Adam Golden from Kaye Scholer. Golden represents corporations and private equity entities active in the pharmaceuticals and biotech sectors as they undertake M&A, joint ventures, securities offerings, and IP licensing deals.
Also in New York, MCDERMOTT WILL & EMERY announced the hiring of Leonard Klingbaum as a partner. Klingbaum represents hedge funds and private equity funds in restructurings, workouts and distressed situations. McDermott also lured Stephanie McCann as a partner in Chicago. McCann’s sweet spot is the representation of private equity firms and their portfolio companies in M&A, LBOs, and restructurings of credit facilities. Both Klingbaum and McCann were previously at Kirkland & Ellis.
In Washington COVINGTON & BURLING lured a pair of corporate lawyers whose focus is financial institution M&A. Veteran lawyers Frank “Rusty” Conner and Michael Reed, who both practiced law at DLA Piper previously, join the firm as partners.
On the project finance side, ARNOLD & PORTER welcomed back a former associate, Joseph Tirone, as a partner in Washington. Tirone, who joined from Bracewell & Giuliani, has worked with hedge funds and private equity funds as well as energy traders and independent power producers and possesses experience in the engineering of power purchase agreements, development agreements, procurement and construction contracts, hedging arrangements, and other documents and structures. The announcement of Tirone’s hiring came just days after Arnold & Porter welcomed REITs and securities lawyer Samantha Gallagher as a Washington-based partner from Bass Berry & Sims.
In Central America, HOLLAND & KNIGHT’S Mexico City office snagged a team of corporate lawyers from DLA Piper, consisting of corporate finance partner Guillermo Uribe Lara and associates Adrian Gay Lasa, Jorge Gonzalez, and Mirna Ordaz, along with paralegal Santiago Soldevilla. In Brazil, HOGAN LOVELLS announced the opening of a São Paulo office, where capital markets lawyer Isabel Costa Carvalho, formerly of Clifford Chance, will play a prominent role.
Asia/Pacific
SLAUGHTER AND MAY finally broke its lateral hire deadlock and for the first time in its 125-year history it hired directly into partnership. This piece of history happened in Asia when the firm strengthened its capital markets team in Hong Kong with the hire of Morrison & Foerster’s (MoFo) co-head of China capital markets John Moore. The move gives the international firm U.S. law capability for capital markets transactions in Hong Kong.
There has also been a string of other hires across diverse practice areas in Hong Kong. LATHAM & WATKINS hired banking partner Howard Lam from Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer; HERBERT SMITH FREEHILLS brought in financial services regulatory expert William Hallatt from Linklaters; WEIL GOTSHAL & MANGES recruited investment funds specialist Albert Cho from Kirkland & Ellis; and DLA PIPER hired restructuring and insolvency partner Mark Fairbairn from O'Melveny & Myers.
Elsewhere, ALLEN & OVERY in Tokyo bolstered its M&A team with the hire of partner Nick Wall from Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and YOON & YANG in Seoul brought in Seung-Hwan Park from the Korean Environment Corporation.
Looking south in Singapore, Ashley Bell also joined DLA from O’Melveny & Myers as of-counsel. Also corporate partner Tom Platts made his move from Herbert Smith Freehills to STEPHENSON HARWOOD, while corporate partner Vivi Tan joins VIRTUS LAW from Colin Ng & Partners. Platts is known for his work in cross-border M&A and private equity and Tan involves herself with equity capital markets matters, general corporate and corporate finance work.
In Cambodia, SOK SIPHANA & ASSOCIATES - part of Malaysian regional firm ZICOlaw - has welcomed two new partners to their team, Matthew Rendall previously managing partner at Sciaroni & Associates and Chulapong Yukate from Deacons. Rendall will work closely with founder partner Dr. Sok Siphana on matters related to commercial, investment, labour, and property, in Cambodia; whereas Yukate will be based in Malaysia as senior advisor for the firm’s Indochina and Myanmar practice.
Down under in Australia, Martin Irwin joined BAKER & MCKENZIE’s project finance team from Herbert Geer, a firm that has since merged with Thomsons Lawyers to form THOMSON GEER.
Europe, Middle East, & Africa
Mid-January to mid-February saw a flurry of moves between firms in Paris, several involving Dentons. Among them was the departure of the former Sonier & Associés restructuring and insolvency (R&I) duo Gabriel Sonier and Caroline Texier. Having left their original boutique to join Salans in 2011 the pair has now made for GIDE LOYRETTE NOUEL. The hire fills a gap at Gide following the loss of R&I department head Oliver Puech to Bredin Prat.
Dentons also lost corporate partner Johannes Jonas (also originally from Salans) to midsized U.S. firm COHEN & GRESSER, which made the hire to help launch its Paris office. Jonas has an international background, having previously worked with Bruckhaus Westrick Stegemann and Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton in Germany, the U.S., and France. The launch creates the firm’s third office after New York and Seoul.
Paris newcomer REED SMITH acquired its fifth partner last month in the form of HOGAN LOVELLS corporate group head Isabelle MacElhone, who joined with associate Bertrand Baheu-Derras. Shortly afterwards, Hogan Lovells itself raided Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom for corporate counsel Sophie Thomazi and added counsel Katia Merlini, a debt capital markets and structured finance specialist, from Simmons & Simmons. For its part, SIMMONS & SIMMONS recruited securities and derivatives counsel Asdrig Bourmayan, who had only recently joined Ashurst in 2013.
Another newcomer, K&L GATES, hired corporate partner Jean-Patrice Labautière from Allen & Overy. Labautière advises investment funds and handles LBOs and M&A and has a particular experience in the healthcare, financial services and technology sectors.
Elsewhere, boutique LACOURTE RAQUIN TATAR poached RBS head of legal Cédric Bonnet, who was also the bank’s director of the global restructuring group; FRESHFIELDS BRUCKHAUS DERINGER recruited finance counsel Geoffrey Levesque from Allen & Overy and HERBERT SMITH FREEHILLS picked up funds counsel Julien Vandenbussche from Gide.
Finally, FRIED FRANK HARRIS SHRIVER & JACOBSON, which had carved a strong niche for itself in restructuring and insolvency, lost their last permanent Paris-based partner Eric Cafritz to London.
Arguably the most significant move in Spain in the past month was ALLEN & OVERY’S announcement that it had recruited corporate partner Antoni Valverde from Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer to launch its office in Barcelona. Valverde has a background in private equity, cross-border M&A and in various sectors including infrastructure, energy, financial services, and TMT.
Elsewhere, BAKER & MCKENZIE hired Barcelona-based banking partner Marcel Enrich from Clifford Chance and HERBERT SMITH FREEHILLS added DAC Beachcroft real estate partner Javier Ortega de la Peña in Madrid.
Several international firms were in an acquisitive mood in Germany during the last four weeks. In January, OLSWANG recruited banking and finance lawyer Hans Reckers, previously a senior board member at Deutsche Bundesbank, as a senior of counsel in Berlin. BIRD & BIRD meanwhile added partner Hans Peter Leube to its Frankfurt corporate group from Schalast & Partner, while KING & SPALDING added life sciences partner Ulf Grundmann from the U.K. Food & Drug Administration.
Another notable development on the German market was the launch of BERNER FLECK WETTICH. Former Hengeler Mueller associates Olaf Berner, Thilo Fleck, and Carsten Wettich launched the corporate boutique in mid-January. While Berner and Wettich were with Hengeler up until the new venture was opened, Fleck was working for Heuking Kühn Lüer Wojtek.
Compared to the first few weeks of 2014 ,the end of January/beginning of February was much quieter in the London laterals market. However there were still notable moves made by U.S. firms. WHITE & CASE moved for Clifford Chance’s Inigo Esteve, an equity capital markets partner; BAKER BOTTS added Chadbourne project finance specialist Robin Mizrahi; JONES DAY enhanced its restructuring capabilities with BLP’s practice head Ben Larkin; and REED SMITH got their own Ben in the form of Travers Smith leveraged finance lawyer Ben Davis.
In Brussels MAYER BROWN made the notable hire of Julian Ellison from Ashurst. Ellison practice covers all the key areas of competition law and he has a particular focus on the transport and telecommunications sectors. SCHOENHERR also announced that it was transferring partner Volker Weiss to head up its office in Brussels, which would be upgraded from a representative outpost.
Two other moves on the continent saw JONES DAY hire private equity partner Alessandro Corno from DLA Piper in Milan, while in Istanbul, Baker & McKenzie’s local ally ESIN hired M&A partner Eren Kursun from Akol.
Finally, in the Middle East KING & WOOD MALLESONS SJ BERWIN, following on from last month’s Riyadh office opening, made a significant appointment, recruiting senior associate Tom Calnan from BLP to head its real estate group for the region in January.