In a bid to improve its City TMT offering, Ashurst has hired TMT duo Nick Elverston and Amanda Hale from Herbert Smith Freehills (HSF) in London.
In what is a ‘major boost’ for Ashurst’s City TMT offering, the dual partner hire will see HSF’s current co-head of global TMT group Elverston, who has been a HSF-partner since 2004 and before that was a partner in the Clifford Chance TMT practice, join Ashurst alongside Hale.
Hale has been a partner at HSF’s TMT practice since 2011, and has 22 years of experience of advising clients in the TMT sector which includes a stint at Clifford Chance and also working as GC at a start-up M2M technology company and at the UK telecoms regulator.
Both Elverston and Hale focus on transactional, commercial and regulatory matters and will be based in London, focussing on EMEA & US whilst also working alongside Australia’s TMT practice.
The firm’s chairman Ben Tidswell said: ‘[The] appointment represents a significant step in the further development of our presence in the digital economy, working for clients which are high growth, high tech and international in nature.’
Ashurst head of TMT Lisa Ritson added the partners join as the ‘demand for TMT expertise continues to grow exponentially, driven by businesses across all industries looking to harness new technologies to gain competitive advantage’.
At the beginning of the year, Ashurst added to its City bench with the hire of DLA Piper’s high-profile international arbitration head Matthew Saunders, after what was a slow churn of lateral partner hires in Ashurst’s London office.
The firm is currently on the hunt for its next managing partner as current head James Collis is to stand down after completing his term at the end of May 2016. The firm has started a selection process to find its successor and will announce the successful candidate in due course. The new leader will be Ashurst’s first board-selected head since Tidswell was elected to the run the firm in 2013.
jaishree.kalia@legalease.co.uk
