Weekly Update - 11th November 2024
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Moves:
UK & Ireland
By bringing on London restructuring leaders, Mark Knight and Jifree Cader, from competitor firm Sidley Austin, U.S.-based Davis Polk & Wardwell has strengthened its London offering.
After more than 26 years at Travers Smith, the incentives head has gone to A&O Shearman. Mahesh Varia, who was highly regarded, was in charge of incentives and compensation at Travers Smith.
Oliver Sweeney was hired as general counsel by top 50 UK and Ireland business Browne Jacobson, a newly established position designed to support the company's internal legal and compliance operations. After serving as head of legal and enforcement for the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) in 2004, Sweeney rejoins Browne Jacobson, the firm where he began his career.
Richard Kelly, a specialist in capital markets and structured finance, has joined Ogier's banking and finance unit in Ireland. Mr. Kelly offers domestic and foreign client’s advice on all facets of transactions involving debt capital markets.
EMEA
Andre Anthony joins from the London office of the global firm. He has been elevated to partner in addition to moving. He provides corporate and individual clients with advice on a wide range of domestic and international tax matters as a chartered accountant and solicitor.
The company has set up its regional headquarters in Riyadh, and Ahmed Alrikhaimi moved there from Houston. James Clark, who joined the business in October 2023 to open the practice in Riyadh, will collaborate with Alrikhaimi on building and projects.
APAC
The international law firm DLA Piper has added Soumitro Mukerji as a partner in its Singapore office, broadening its banking and finance offerings. Joining Mayer Brown from Hogan Lovells Lee & Lee in 2022, Mukerji provides fund finance, sponsor-backed financing, structured lending, limited recourse financing, and corporate lending advice to funds, banks, financial institutions, corporations, and financial advisers across Asia and Europe.
David Kerwin left Clyde & Co. for the Australian business Sparke Helmore, continuing the migration of insurance partners from Clyde & Co.
Brad Roach, a partner at Gibson Dunn & Crutcher, has joined K&L Gates in Singapore as an energy, infrastructure, and resources partner. Alexandra Jones, an associate who has been with Gibson Dunn for nearly seven years, goes with him.
Liang-Ying Tan, a lawyer from New York, has joined British disputes boutique Seladore Legal as a partner as the firm prepares to open in Singapore. In order to propel the company's expansion in the city-state of Singapore, Tan will eventually move there.
Adrian Bae, a top foreign attorney in Seoul, has bolstered the regulatory capabilities of Yoon & Yang, a South Korean law company. Bae formerly held the position of vice president for North Asia at British American Tobacco (BAT), where he now joins.
Benjamin Choi, a seasoned intellectual property attorney who previously served as managing director and consultant at Oldham Li & Nie's OLN IP Services, has joined PRC law firm Jingtian & Gongcheng as a partner in Hong Kong.
In house
Before Hope Mehlman leaves as legal chief on November 27, Discover had intended to close the deal. However, Capital One has admitted that it is no longer possible to complete the deal this year.
The Americas
In New York, Jennifer K. Shanley joined the company's technology and digital health division. Digital health providers, pharmaceutical, biologic, and medical device manufacturers, clinical laboratories, pharmacies, health systems, hospitals, skilled nursing facilities, provider practice groups, home care agencies, health insurers, charitable foundations, and businesses that support or invest in the healthcare sector are among the clients of Shanley that receive regulatory advice.
Duane Morris LLP has brought on a former Stinson LLP partner for its corporate practice group in New York. Cris Cicala is a corporate, finance and banking attorney with more than 20 years of domestic and international experience.
Sebastian Tiller practiced at Simpson Thacher for 19 years, and he became a partner in 2016
Morgan Lewis acquired private equity partner Jonathan Dhanawade from Paul Hastings after hiring tech partner Marina Aronchik from Mayer Brown.
In her most recent roles as Deputy Chief of the Criminal Division and Co-Chair of the Artificial Intelligence Working Group, Margaret Graham served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York for the previous eleven years.
Simpson Thacher opened a Boston office earlier this year, and Matthew Fisher came from Kirkland & Ellis as the fifth partner. Adam Cromie joined from Jones Day in New York and will transfer to the firm's Washington, DC office next year.
According to Tad J. Freese, a managing partner in the California office of Latham & Watkins, "the majority of our regulatory expertise at Latham sits in our East Coast offices."
Premier environmental litigator and crisis management advisor Stephen Fitzgerald has joined Paul Hastings LLP as a partner in Dallas, further growing the company's industry-leading environmental litigation practice.
A corporate litigation principal is added by Bressler, a health care counsel is welcomed by Brach Eichler, and other changes are made.
O’Melveny announced that highly regarded energy transactions lawyer David Aaronson has joined the firm’s Houston office as a partner in its Energy Industry Group
Team Moves
Global law firm Freshfields has today announced the appointment of leading private capital lawyers Paul Stewart, Mark Davis and Nick Fortune as partners to its Global Transactions practice in London. Stewart will serve as Global Co-Head of Private Credit & Capital Solutions alongside New York-based partner Damian Ridealgh.
In order to establish an energy transactions practice at Seyfarth Shaw, a group from Polsinelli, headed by partner Chris Cottrell, relocated to the Houston office.
Financials:
According to Law.com International study, a few elite law firms have benefited greatly from the U.K. M&A market recovery, with one firm in particular showing remarkable productivity.
Promotions & Appointments:
Recommended by LinkedIn
It is anticipated that the new addition will boost the business court's capacity as part of a "sustained expansion."
General counsel Hector Ruiz has been replaced by associate general counsel Sean Yan at the Justin, Texas-based firm, which sold just 22 electric vehicles in 2023.
Although he has experience guiding a company through turbulent times, this is David McAtee's first director position.
Matthew O. Talmo, a bankruptcy and restructuring lawyer, has been invited to join Morris Nichols Arsht & Tunnell, with effect from January 1, 2025.
On Wednesday, Latham & Watkins announced that it was elevating 24 associates to partner status, including seven attorneys from Europe and the Middle East and 17 from the United States. In recent years, Latham's fall promotions have been getting smaller. With effect from January 2025, the number of colleagues promoted to partner has decreased by 10 compared to the 34 associates Latham promoted to partner in November of last year. The company said that it was advancing 44 colleagues to partner status in 2022, which was the same number as the year before.
The head of Baker's Asia Pacific capital markets business and Singaporean principal Ashok Lalwani will be replaced as the firm's Indian practice leader by Mini Menon vandePol, who has been with the company for over 25 years. Lalwani, who has been in the position for 12 years, will remain a member of the steering committee for India practices, which is made up of 14 other attorneys from around the world.
According to DLA Piper, employment law partner Philippe Danesi joined the firm's executive committee on November 1st, and Fanny Combourieu took over as the country managing paper for France on the same day.
Hui Wen Tan was a senior associate at Skrine before joining the Malaysian law firm Jeff Leong, Poon & Wong (JLPW) as a partner and head of dispute resolution.
Diversity & Inclusion:
Diversity consultant Joelle Emerson made the argument that "law firms should talk more about what they're doing." "One of the things that makes this so controversial is that people don't know what these programs are."
Employers nationwide have been coping with an increase in lawsuits aimed at workplace diversity, equality, and inclusion (DEI) policies and initiatives since the historic ruling.
Dana Denis-Smith, CEO of Obelisk Support, claims that legal leaders are not getting paid for their efforts to implement and enhance DEI.
Office Openings & Closing:
Although the reasons and conditions are different from those of its American counterparts, the closure makes it the first legal practice based in the United Kingdom to close an office in Mainland China.
While tenants fill their temporary office spaces, the eagerly anticipated Grade A commercial building is already operational.
TMI Associates, a Japanese law company, has opened an office in Brussels as part of its European expansion. After Paris and London, this is TMI Associates' third trip to Europe. The business said in a statement that the new office is part of its mission to "give clients information on the latest trends in [European Union] law." It will work closely with its offices in France and the United Kingdom.
Tokyo International Law Office (TKI), a Japanese boutique, is opening its first overseas office in Singapore. The company is scheduled to start operations in January of next year after receiving its license to practice foreign law. The new company will be led by Koki Yamada, a co-founder and co-managing partner of TKI.
Mergers & Alliances:
Lippes Mathias is opening its second Florida office and growing past 200 lawyers after merging with West Palm Beach boutique Ward Damon as both seek scale to hire more talent in the region.
Technology & Innovation:
This article delves into discussions about artificial intelligence and its impact in the courtroom.
"Lawyers accustomed to week-long turnarounds for contract reviews may find their clients demanding same-day service to keep up with sales/growth teams," according to Aaron Boersma, author of "Keeping Pace: Law Firms in the Era of AI-Driven Business."
At the New York City Bar Association's "UN Summit of the Future: International Regulation of AI" webcast, speakers from a range of international organizations talked on the obstacles to and potential for global AI regulation.
At a recent Association of Corporate Counsel gathering, legal chiefs stated that they want outside counsel to be transparent and collaborative when it comes to generative AI deployment.
"We're not just looking to research AI and other areas, we're looking to actually embrace it and lead out front with it," stated Jared Kaplan, the newly appointed chief innovation and information officer of Lowenstein Sandler.
Although in-house legal teams are at ease offering legal counsel on AI-related issues, a large number of workers are expressing difficulty keeping up.
Several big legal firms claim that new hires are far more interested in AI than partners, so what can be done?
Market Commentary:
This contains a report from a distinguished panel of experts about the most recent international decisions, approaches to arbitration and mediation, and tactics for resolving discrepancies in court decisions in matters pertaining to climate change.
Chief Desmond Racicot (Ret), senior director of business development at Cellebrite, and Andrew Wylie, the district attorney for Clinton County, talk about the increasing use of AI in digital investigations and how New York practitioners might use the technology to expedite but still uphold the law.
Squire Patton Boggs Dallas managing partner Jon Mureen stated that he plans to recruit several corporate attorneys and grow the office's data privacy division in the near future.
"If he doesn't do anything radically different than what he did his first term, we're probably not looking at any tectonic shift in how the outlook is for law firms in the United States," Kevin Broyles, founder and CEO of FisherBroyles.
For some customers, having a physical location in the biggest economy in the area provides more comfort in addition to tax advantages. Some businesses, however, are happy to serve the nation from a distance.
"There are some similarities between the current situation and the environment that employers encountered during the pandemic. Regarding her expectations for the upcoming Trump administration, managing partner and head of Seyfarth Shaw Lorie Almon stated, "Businesses had to make business decisions without knowing what the future would hold."
According to a recent analysis by Baker & McKenzie and Positive Luxury, upcoming global ESG standards will be a catalyst for reform within the luxury sector.