In this week’s round-up of lateral appointments, Clifford Chance (CC) and RPC have added to the benches in Hong Kong, while Dentons has hired in Europe and Lawyers on Demand’s (LOD) Jonathan Brenner has taken on a new part-time role at Keystone Law.
CC has strengthened its corporate practice in Hong Kong with the appointment of partner Frank Yuen from local firm Woo Kwan Lee & Lo.
Yuen, who will join in early 2017, leaves one of Hong Kong’s heavyweight independent law firms, known for its real estate work. CC Asia corporate head Mark Shipman said Yuen had one of the strongest profiles for M&A and equity capital markets in the region and his knowledge would reinforce the firm’s reputation in high-value transactions. Following Yuen’s arrival, CC will have 34 corporate partners in Asia-Pacific.
Also in Hong Kong, RPC has bolstered its own corporate practice with the hire of Jeremy Cunningham from Mayer Brown. The M&A and private equity specialist made partner in 2011 and recently acted for Redwood Investment Company on its all-stock merger with Shang Cayman, to create one of the largest logistics real estate platforms in Asia.
In Europe, Dentons has deepened its real estate bench with the hire of Solera Holdings’ general counsel for Europe, Middle East and Africa David Dixon. Dixon has more than 25 years’ experience advising on real estate transactions and has previously been head of Norton Rose’s corporate finance team in Warsaw.
Dentons’ Europe real estate chair, Pawel Debowski, said: ‘Set against a backdrop of the growing number of cross-border portfolio transactions involving Poland that we’re currently seeing, his experience in leading international deals will certainly be appreciated by our clients.’
Finally, co-founder of Lawyers On Demand (LOD) Brenner has taken on a part-time role driving recruitment at alternative provider Keystone Law. He will remain with LOD spending two days at the contract lawyer service. Brenner launched LOD with former Berwin Leighton Paisner partner Simon Harper in 2007 as part of the firm. It was later announced it would spin off in 2012.
LOD has also promoted its key account manager Rachel Murphy who will take on the role of head of client solutions. The promotion follows Tim Bratton’s resignation following his decision to move to Euromoney Institutional Investor.
victoria.young@legalease.co.uk
