Eversheds has become the latest firm to enter the Northern Irish legal market with the launch of an outpost in Belfast covering general commercial and public sector legal work.
The office, headed up by projects partner Peter Curran and based next to Belfast City Hall, is not currently full-service but will carry out legal work as part of Eversheds’ international network. The work will be serviced initially by lawyers from Eversheds’ existing offices in the UK and Dublin, but the firm is also looking to hire locally as well.
The launch is seen as ‘plugging a gap’ in Eversheds’ current offering across the UK and Ireland which includes offices in most of the main commercial centres and regional capitals including London, Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, Cardiff, Edinburgh and Dublin.
The firm announced today (22 June) that it is also launching a new branch of its consulting service, Eversheds Ignite. The offering will be focused on helping in-house teams outsource high volume, low risk work such as statements of work and non-disclosure agreements.
The new office follows Eversheds’ merger earlier this month with its German partner Heisse Kursawe Eversheds following a full year of advanced negotiations. Eversheds will trade in Germany as Eversheds Deutschland and primarily practice in areas including corporate M&A, real estate and human resources. Around 30% of clients are currently shared between the firms, mainly US multinationals with operations in Germany.
Eversheds’ ongoing expansion strategy also saw the firm announce the creation of two new alliance networks covering Asia Pacific and Latin America, initiatives intended to further formalise relationships with local firms, but remain non-exclusive.
kathryn.mccann@legalease.co.uk
