In the latest of a series of heavyweight City hires, Latham & Watkins is to bring in Macfarlanes’ environmental specialist Paul Davies as a partner in its environment, land and resources group.
Davies will become the first sole environmental specialist to join the 20-strong European team, charged with developing the Los Angeles-founded firm’s transactional and contentious environmental practice in London.
Davies, who has been at Macfarlanes since 2001 and became a partner in 2005, will particularly focus on servicing existing corporate clients who have environmental needs across the energy sector. He will work closely with the firm’s US offices, particularly Houston where Latham already has an established energy practice, and alongside global chair of environment, land and resources, Bob Wyman.
‘The firm has a strong corporate client base and energy practice in the US but needed tier-one environmental expertise in Europe,’ said Latham’s London managing partner Nick Cline (pictured).
Davies’ experience includes providing advice on the environmental aspects of corporate, regulatory and contentious issues, as well as on contaminated land, environmental risk and climate change. He has previously advised Oak Hill Capital on the $2bn secondary buyout of Firth Rixson, a manufacturer of specialised metal products for the aerospace industry.
The Slaughter and May-trained lawyer is the fifth partner hire announced by Latham’s London office since January, following the appointments of Nick Benson from Weil Gotshal & Manges; Kem Ihenacho from Clifford Chance; Lucy Oddy from Berwin Leighton Paisner; and Tom Alabaster from The Carlyle Group. The office now has over 250 fee-earners including 65 partners.
Cline added: ‘Our growth in London, particularly our investment in our corporate and litigation practices, has created an obvious opportunity to develop a market-leading transactional and contentious environmental practice, while also significantly enhancing our existing EU environmental regulatory credentials.’
Davies added: ‘Latham has a top-ranked global environmental practice, and a reputation for advising on the most complex cross-border transactions involving lawyers from multiple jurisdictions. This international capability will give me an ideal platform to further develop my practice.’
Jaishree.kalia@legalease.co.uk