Matthew Elliott’s long-mooted arrival at Kirkland & Ellis from Linklaters stole headlines last week, but LB 100 firms including DLA Piper, Eversheds and DWF also all made hires.
DLA Piper continued to rebuild its depleted Asia offering with the capture of Morrison & Foerster capital markets partner Melody He-Chen.
He-Chen’s practice is largely made up of Chinese corporates, specialising in securities offerings. Her arrival follows the hire of a group of former Jones Day colleagues in Singapore, with corporate partners John Viverito and Myles Hankin joining from Gibson Dunn & Crutcher and Joseph Bauerschmidt from Jones Day.
Terry O’Malley, chairman emeritus of DLA Piper, said ‘Melody’s experience of working in the United States will help further align the Asia business with the strategic objectives of the firm and reflects the growing business flows we are seeing between the two regions.’
Eversheds, intent on improving its offering in continental Europe, added three partners in Switzerland last week. The firm hired BNP Paribas lawyer Patrick Eberhardt to boost its banking group and made moves to improve its transport group with the addition of two partners.
Barbara Klett, who recently established the national claim centre for the Swiss Federal Railways, joins as a partner from local firm Kaufmann Rüedi Rechtsanwälte. She advises on liability issues in the transport and medical sectors and is a lecturer at the University of Lucerne. The firm also added procurement projects lawyer Bruno Schoch as its head of rail, leaving his position as head of legal at Swiss rail company BLS to take up the post.
Klett said ‘investment in transport continues to be high on the agenda’ for governments and said her new firm has ‘one of the largest teams of specialist lawyers acting for some of the world’s major transport providers’.
Back in the UK, rapidly expanding DWF has hired Tods Murray’s head of renewables Ben Powell in Edinburgh. The project finance lawyer has had stints at Dundas & Wilson, McGrigors and Hammonds in the past and brings extensive knowledge of the Scottish and UK energy markets.
His hire follows the capture of former Royal Bank of Scotland in-house lawyer Gary MacDonald from Pinsent Masons, where he was a legal director.
tom.moore@legalease.co.uk