Ahead of its 1 May merger with City firm Lawrence Graham, Wragge & Co has more than doubled the number of partner promotions it made last year to five, including two in its housing, development & regeneration team.
Ed Colreavy and Jacqueline Knox were made up in the housing practice. In other practice areas, Ian Gordon was made up in pensions disputes, Jasvir Jootla in restructuring and corporate recovery, and Gus Wood in the firm’s energy group.
Senior partner Quentin Poole said: ‘We have looked at talent, experience, client requirements and growth opportunities, and have decided to promote these five exceptional individuals to the partnership.’
In contrast, Olswang has made up just one new partner apiece in its London and Berlin offices. The promotion of Kevin Cordina and Gordon Geiser to partnership at Olswang, which takes effect from 1 May, will bring the number of partners in the top-40 LB100 firm to 121 across eight offices in Europe and Asia.
This is one fewer than last year for the firm, which promoted three to partnership in March 2013, again in London and Berlin.
Cordina is a patent lawyer, specialising in electronics and will be based in the firm’s City base, while Geiser – a dual qualified restructuring and insolvency expert in Berlin – will help the firm extend its cross-border capability and supports the recently launched Olswang Restructuring Solutions, which is aimed at providing counsel to companies, managers, shareholders and creditors during crises and near-critical situations in Germany.
Meanwhile top-30 LB100 firm DAC Beachcroft has appointed 16 to partnership, more than three times the five associates promoted in each of the last two years. Over half (nine) of the promoted lawyers across the firm’s Birmingham, Bristol, Leeds and Newport offices were women, while five promotions were in its City base, taking the total number of partners at the firm to 256.
While the majority of promotions took place in across various divisions of the firm’s signature insurance practice, three lawyers in both corporate and commercial and real estate have also been promoted.
This comes after the firm promoted two new partners in its Madrid office last December, José María Pimentel and Luis Siles.
DAC Beachcroft managing partner, Paul Murray, said: ‘After years of relative steadiness, this year’s bumper promotion numbers are a clear sign of our solid commercial performance to date and the ambition we have for future growth. As ever, the growth of the business is led by what our clients need. This is reflected in the various practice areas, sector expertise and locations of those being promoted.’
DAC Beachcroft 2014 partner promotions in full:
Hans Allnutt, global insurance (London)
Anne Batanero, real estate (Bristol)
Louise Bloomfield, employment & pensions (Leeds)
Anthony Carrington and Dan Prince, claims validation team (Birmingham)
Kathy Farmer, practice governance & risk (Leeds)
Emma Fuller, motor (Newport)
Barbara Goddard, casualty, (London)
Liz Jones, large loss (Birmingham)
Daniella McGuigan, employment & pensions (Leeds)
Lili Oliver, motor (Bristol)
Ben Pariser, real estate (Bristol)
Glenn Ruddy, real estate (London)
John Singh, corporate & commercial (London)
Alex Von Westernhagen, corporate & commercial (London)
Nick Williams, corporate & commercial (Bristol)
francesca.fanshawe@legalease.co.uk