Ashurst’s London head of pensions Steven Hull has jumped ship for Eversheds’ highly-rated 90-lawyer team, becoming the latest of a series of exits at the top 20 firm.
Hull joined Ashurst in 2005 from US Global 100 top 40 firm McDermott Will & Emery, where he headed the City pensions and employee benefits practice from its 2000 inception. He will leave Ashurst on 20 March, joining Eversheds on 1 May.
Taking over Hull’s role as London pensions chief at Ashurst will be partner Marcus Fink, while Caroline Carter will continue in her role as head of the firm’s employment, incentives and pensions group, which has 20 partners internationally.
With over two and a half decades’ experience in pension-related matters, Hull’s expertise includes pension scheme reorganisations and mergers, deficit reduction strategies and scheme funding negotiations, changing and closing benefit structures, the pension aspects of corporate transactions and disputes involving the Pensions Regulator.
Commenting on his own appointment, Hull said: ‘I was attracted by the opportunity to join Eversheds due to its reputation in the market and its unrivalled capabilities in the pensions arena. I look forward to joining the team and working collaboratively to grow the practice.’
Eversheds’ head of pensions Francois Barker said: ‘Steven is a talented and highly capable lawyer who will complement our existing pensions practice as we continue to increase our mandates and cement our position as the genuine market leaders in all pensions related matters.’
Clients of Eversheds’ pensions team include Accenture, the BA pension schemes, Bombardier, DHL, DuPont, GE, John Lewis, National Grid, Severn Trent, Siemens, United Utilities, Vauxhall, Veolia and Volkswagen.
Ashurst has suffered a number of departures since ex-senior partner Charlie Geffen unexpectedly lost the chairman vote to litigator Ben Tidswell last October, most recently private equity partner Karan Dinamani, who joins former Ashurst corporate head Stephen Lloyd at Allen & Overy.
Francesca.fanshawe@legalease.co.uk
