After an initial flurry of hires in September there has been a pause for breath, leaving Osborne Clarke (OC) and Morgan, Lewis & Bockius to bring in senior lawyers in the UK in recent days.
Pinsent Masons has seen financial services regulation partner Michael Lewis depart for UK top 25 rival OC. After a career which has spanned Norton Rose, Linklaters, Simmons & Simmons and a secondment as policy adviser to the Treasury in 2000/01, Lewis spent six years at Pinsents. OC head of business transactions Greg Leyshon said Lewis would help strengthen the firm’s financial institutions practice.
OC has recently been busy expanding globally, with the opening of a new office in Stockholm led by two laterals. The firm also posted one of the strongest set of results in the UK top 100 this year, with revenues up 12%.
Pinsents itself has been recruiting proactively this year and has largely retained its partners. Last week it announced the hire of Chris Richardson from Big Four group EY to lead its forensic accounting service. It also took three partners from Gowling WLG to bolster its Munich arm in February and a new head for its corporate practice in the financial sector in January.
Elsewhere, Morgan Lewis took former A&O counsel Louise Skinner as a partner, joining the US law firm’s labour and employment team. Practice head Grace Speights cited her focus ‘on the intersection of employment and regulatory issues, especially in the financial services and life sciences sector’, as a ‘great complement’ to the team.
Skinner is the latest in a series of City hires for the 1,900-lawyer firm. Earlier this year, Morgan Lewis bolstered its white collar team with two partners from Norton Rose Fulbright’s City base.