Reed Smith’s managing partner for Europe, Middle East and Asia, Roger Parker, discusses international expansion, Chinese law firms and trying to get more corporate work.
Sir Nigel Knowles, who is set to step down as co-CEO and managing partner at DLA Piper later this year, has been appointed chairman of UK investment banking boutique Zeus Capital.
Bingham McCutchen’s Hong Kong office has been put in a precarious position with Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld making a two partner hire to take the number of partners joining the firm from Bingham to 28, while remaining capital markets partner Vincent Sum’s future is unclear.
Linklaters’ corporate heavyweight Charlie Jacobs and private equity partner Alex Woodward advised US private equity firm Carlyle on the sale of half of its majority stake in roadside recovery service RAC after abandoning plans to exit the company through a London IPO.
Steven Davis, who led SJ Berwin’s City corporate team before its $1bn Sino-Australian merger, is set to leave the firm for Proskauer Rose, whose own merger plans with SJ Berwin collapsed before the City firm looked eastwards for growth.
Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton and Clifford Chance picked up the lead roles along with a raft of offshore firms as Russian aluminum giant Rusal carried out a $5.15bn debt restructuring following a slower than expected recovery in the commodities market.
Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld has continued its takeover of Bingham McCutchen’s $50m revenue London office with the hire of four more partners leaving only two partners representing the beleaguered US firm in the City.
Linklaters’ Stockholm outpost closed two major deals last week being selected by Microsoft to handle its $2.5bn acquisition of Mojang, which was advised by Mannheimer Swartling, and TDC’s $2.2bn acquisition of Get AS.
Top 20 firm Ashurst has made 15 redundancies to its overnight production staff in London nearly halving the City firm’s 34-person team following a consultation process last month.
Berwin Leighton Paisner has parachuted in Bob Charlton to head its Asia group, a role he held at DLA Piper until late last year when a management reshuffle led to his exit.
