Legal Business

Revolving doors: It’s one in, two out at Clyde & Co while DWF boosts practice in Dubai

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Strategic recruitment Clyde & CoDWF
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Clyde & Co has appointed Mark Sutton as a senior equity partner in its professional financial disputes group. Sutton joined from national firm DAC Beachcroft where he was head of its global directors & officers and financial institutions group.

Going the other way, commodities trade finance partner Philip Prowse has left Clydes for Holman Fenwick Willan, having joined the firm back in 2011. His departure follows that of finance and insolvency specialist Terry Green who has also left the firm to join the London office of Chicago headquartered Katten Muchin Rosenman.

DWF has hired Baker & McKenzie Habib Al Mulla arbitration head Gordon Blanke as a partner in the firm’s international commercial arbitration team. Based in DWF’s first international office in Dubai, which opened this year, Blanke has been lead counsel and arbitrator in a number of leading international cases under a wide range of UK and international rules of arbitration, as well as ad hoc cases and also holds rights of audience before the Dubai International Financial Centre courts.

Meanwhile in Paris, Gide Loyrette Nouel has hired Cuatrecasas, Gonçalves Pereira partner Nuria Bové to create an Iberian desk in the French capital. The Gide Cuatrecasas’ Iberian Desk will support Iberian and Latin American companies on their operations in France, as well as French clients on their operations in the Iberian Peninsula and Latin America. Both firms said the specialist team will naturally work alongside all of Gide’s other practice groups and international offices and was born out of a long-standing relationship between the French and Iberian firm, along with Chiomenti in Italy and Gleiss Lutz in Germany.

At the Bar, 11KBW has hired Julian Blake of 6KBW College Hill to add to its public law team. The chambers said the hire was in line with its strategy to consolidate and enhance three core areas of practice commercial, employment and public law. 

victoria.young@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

Clyde & Co ramps up South African offering with Norton Rose, ENS hires

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Strategic recruitment Clyde & CoENSafricaNorton Rose Fulbright
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Clyde & Co has continued its seemingly relentless international push of the last 18 months, this time recruiting ten new lawyers including five partners in South Africa, bringing the total number of legal staff across its Johannesburg and Cape Town offices to 30.

The Global 100 firm, which has been in South Africa since May 2014, bulks up its presence at a time when major firms such as Herbert Smith Freehills and DLA Piper are just establishing practices on the ground.

From Norton Rose Fulbright the firm has hired head of insurance Tony Hardie and former director Amelia Costa, who is also an insurance specialist. The duo join as partners and will be accompanied by Christopher MacRoberts and Ina Iyer at the firm’s Johannesburg office.

Hardie is recommended by The Legal 500 for dispute resolution and was with Norton Rose for almost 30 years, while Costa had been with the firm since 2006.

Two more partners join Clyde & Co from local leader Edward Nathan Sonnenbergs (ENS) Africa, with litigators Robert Scott and Alon Meyerov joining the Johannesburg office along with Nicole Gabryk and Kate Swart who join as associates. Scott has spent six years in the disputes department at ENS, while Meyerov’s focus is on disputes in the construction and engineering sectors.

The firm has also appointed Athol Gordon from another strong domestic firm, Bowman Gilman. Gordon is a medical malpractice lawyer who joins as partner. With more than 20 years’ experience, he will be posted in the Cape Town office.

Clyde & Co international arbitration group partner Maurice Kenton, who has been involved in the firm’s expansion into South Africa, said: ‘With this latest expansion we are now not only firmly established as a top tier insurance practice in the region but have also positioned ourselves in a position of strength in the commercial and construction disputes space. Our clear strength in disputes, whether domestic or international, and the insurance sector minimises conflicts and means we are uniquely positioned to provide our clients with muscular litigation and arbitration services.’

This latest move in Africa follows Clyde & Co securing a merger with Scottish firm Simpson & Marwick in September, as well as hiring a string of partners to join its global arbitration group over the past 18 months.

The firm has been one of the fastest-growing UK-based firms in recent years, with revenues growing 8% to £395m in 2015.

victoria.young@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

Clyde & Co continues arbitration push with Berwin Leighton Paisner hire

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Strategic recruitment Berwin Leighton PaisnerClyde & Co
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Clyde & Co has hired Berwin Leighton Paisner’s co-head of arbitration and energy specialist Richard Power as it continues to develop its global arbitration group. 

Power, who joins as partner, has more than 15 years’ experience in energy industry disputes and his practice involves complex cross-border matters in the energy sector. He also has expertise in outsourcing, commercial banking and insolvency-related disputes.

According to the Legal 500, which recommends Power for international arbitration, ‘he has a long track record of resolving disputes at an early stage using alternative dispute resolution and especially mediation.’

Clyde & Co co-chair of arbitration Peter Hirst said: ‘The fall in the oil price has caused much disruption in the energy sector. Cancellation of contracts, coupled with geopolitical instability and growing regulation further increases the prospect of disputes arising. With Richard on board, supported by the firm’s global network, we will be even better equipped to service our clients.’

In June the firm’s senior partner James Burns told Legal Business the decision to form an international arbitration group to target commercial disputes had seen the practice grow by 40% in the last year.

In the past 18 months Clyde & Co has hired a string of partners to the global arbitration group including including June Yeum (New York & Asia), Patrick Zheng (Beijing), Christopher Jobson (Abu Dhabi), Brian Dunning (New York) and Prakash Pillai (Singapore).

While the firm has been one of the fastest-growing in the UK in recent years with revenues growing 8% to £395m in 2015, it reviewed its London corporate practice recently after losing a series of substantial mandates to rivals.

The review started at the end of last year and has since seen four partners leave, three of whom resigned in recent months, including one partner that was separately headhunted by a major US firm in what will be regarded as a loss to the firm.

victoria.young@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

Watson Farley hires Clyde & Co corporate partner Nigel Taylor

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Strategic recruitment Clyde & CoWatson Farley and Williams
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Watson Farley & Williams continues to build its City offering through lateral hires, by hiring Clyde & Co corporate partner Nigel Taylor to join the firm.

Recommended by the Legal 500, Taylor joined Clydes in 2010 from Field Fisher Waterhouse (now Fieldfisher) where he headed its corporate transport practice. Taylor advises governments, listed and private UK companies, overseas corporations and multinationals in the natural resource industry, including mining trade and commodities, with a particular focus on rail.

Under previous mandates Taylor advised the government of Guinea on its $20bn Simandou South project, and on corporate aspects of the establishment of the £2bn Pensions Infrastructure Platform to facilitate pension fund investment in UK infrastructure.

Watson Farley is currently in hiring mode, having secured Fried, Frank, Harris, Shiver & Jacobson partners Rob McBride and Sian Withey in June. The pair are tasked with building a debt securities and structured finance practice.

The firm also hired real estate partner Ranjeev Kumar from US firm Katten Muchin Rosenman in April.

Clydes has seen the departure of several partners from its London base in recent months, following a review at the end of last year. The review came after the 319-partner firm lost a series of substantial mandates to rivals after the insurance market saw a surge in M&A deals over the last 12 months.

Watson Farley declined to comment on Taylor’s appointment.

sarah.downey@legalease.co.uk               

Legal Business

Vaulting ambition: Clydes expands with Scottish tie-up

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Scotland Clyde & Co
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Simpson & Marwick merger signed as firm eyes 2016 Miami launch

After months of negotiations, Clyde & Co successfully secured a merger with Scottish firm Simpson & Marwick last month, following other London-based insurance players in establishing a presence in Scotland and adding £30m to the Global 100 firm’s top line.

Legal Business

Clydes sees run of departures after City corporate team comes under scrutiny

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Corporate Clyde & Co
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Several corporate partners have resigned from Clyde & Co’s London office after what has been described as a ‘shoulder tapping exercise’ took place as the practice came under management scrutiny for under performance.

A review started at the end of last year and has since seen four partners leave, three of whom resigned in recent weeks, including one partner that was separately headhunted by a major US firm in what will be regarded as a loss to the firm.

The review came after the 319-partner firm lost a series of substantial mandates to rivals after the insurance market saw a surge in M&A deals over the last 12 months.

It covered Clydes’ global corporate and commercial team but is believed to have focused particularly on transactional partners in the UK, leaving 14 in the group currently, including eight which just focus on corporate work. The firm has some 60 partners in its global corporate and commercial groups, including 30 in Europe.

Clydes has five main sector focuses – insurance; energy; infrastructure; trading and commodities; and transport – the review involved the firm looking at how the corporate and commercial practice could support these core areas better.

The firm has been one of the fastest-growing UK law firms in recent years with revenues growing 8% to £395m in 2015, but insurance litigation specialists have often struggled to extend their practices into lead corporate roles for core clients.

One former partner commented: ‘Clydes is a big firm, people come and go. It has its brand it wants to protect and if you don’t fit in with the core business you may decide it’s not the place to be.’

Meanwhile, in an unrelated move two experienced litigators have also departed – data protection and cyber security head Margaret Tofalides, who is set to join Thomson Reuters in an in-house role, and disputes partner Julian Connerty, who joined Signature Litigation in September.

Clydes declined to comment on the review.

jaishree.kalia@legalease.co.uk, sarah.downey@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

Scottish play: Clyde & Co seals Simpson & Marwick deal

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Scotland Clyde & Co
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After months of negotiations, Clyde & Co has successfully secured a merger with Scottish firm Simpson & Marwick, following other London-based insurance players in establishing a presence in Scotland and adding around £30m to the Global 100 firm’s top line.

Clyde & Co senior partner James Burns said, ‘This is a client-focused merger. Simpson & Marwick is the go-to firm for many of our clients in Scotland and we’ve long held it in high regard. Not only does it firmly position us as the leading insurance-sector firm on both sides of the border but it benefits our clients across all our sectors by giving us a great platform to meet their legal needs in Scotland.’

The deal, which goes live on 1 October, sees 45-partner Simpson & Marwick’s five Scottish offices in Edinburgh, Glasgow, Aberdeen, Dundee and East Lothian plus three English offices Newcastle, London and Leeds, add to Clyde & Co’s 38-office international network, which includes associated offices. The firm will be named Clyde & Co on both sides of the border, consistent with Clyde & Co’s pragmatic approach to firm names, having dispensed with the ‘BLG’ tag soon after merging with City firm Barlow Lyde & Gilbert in 2011.

Simpson & Marwick’s offices in Leeds and Newcastle will remain open and, according to the Scottish firm’s managing partner Gordon Keyden, ‘will complement Clyde & Co’s regional English practice’. Its London office, which only recently had a partner presence, will remain open until the lease expires next April.

While Clyde & Co confirmed that advanced talks were ongoing between the firms in May, Burns noted that the proposed deal involved separate jurisdictions, which added to the complexity. ‘With what is effectively a cross-border deal, things could not be tied up overnight,’ he said. ‘We needed to take the time to ensure that the partnerships of both firms were completely satisfied with the deal, which is why there was unanimous approval on both sides’.

Global head of insurance Simon Konsta said that the deal was sought by both firms as way to effectively service clients on both sides of the border, rather than a response to demand by the firms’ large insurance clients that they offer a one-stop-shop. During negotiations, which began in earnest in January, around 20-25 leading clients were asked to approve the plans.

‘Let us be clear,’ said Keyden. ‘This merger did not have to happen but we’re very glad that it has. This is two financially robust firms coming together in what is an aspirational, ambitious merger.’

Simpson & Marwick had been positioning itself for a merger for some time, having initially had 18 months of merger discussions with English heavyweight insurance player Kennedys that ended at the end of 2013.

Clyde & Co will not be taking on the entirety of the firm – five months ago a 15-strong family law team led by partner Shaun George, left to join Brodies.

The Scottish launch comes on the back of a flurry of new office openings for Clyde & Co in little over a year, including Newport Beach, California (June 2014); Cape Town and Johannesburg (August); its own office in Riyadh (September); and Brisbane (October).

The potential Anglo-Scottish tie-up continues a prolonged incursion by English firms north of the border in the last three years, including McGrigors’ acquisition by Pinsent Masons in 2012 and CMS Cameron McKenna’s acquisition of Dundas & Wilson in 2014.

This latest move means  English insurance players Clyde & Co, DAC Beachcroft, Shoosmiths, DWF, BLM and Kennedys now have offices in Scotland, most of which were achieved through the takeover of a Scottish firm. 

mark.mcateer@legalease.co.uk 

Legal Business

Revolving Doors: Insurance-focused firms invest as Clydes expands in South Africa and DWF hires a former managing partner

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Strategic recruitment Clyde & CoDWF
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Last week saw a flurry of announcements as firms revealed their hires made over the summer. Clyde & Co invested in its South Africa office with a lateral from Linklaters’ ally Webber Wentzel, DWF hired the former managing partner of Anderson Strathern and Holman Fenwick Willan (HFW) hired a partner from Chadbourne & Parke’s City office.

Clydes, which opened up in Johannesburg in May 2014, invested further in its outpost by hiring Ernie van der Vyver from Webber Wentzel. Having led the South African firm’s financial regulatory practice, van der Vyver joins Clydes’ corporate insurance group with a view to increasing its transactional and regulatory capability in the country. He joined Webber Wentzel as a partner in March 2010 from Cliffe Dekker Hofmeyr.

Meanwhile, peer insurance firm HFW hired financial institutions specialist Christopher Cardona into its London office. A disputes partner, Cardona specialises in mandates from the Latin American region and joins the firm’s three partner team currently servicing the area.

Paul Wordley, a senior re-insurance partner and member of HFW’s Strategy Board said: ‘We are seeing significant opportunities in the insurance and reinsurance sector in Latin America and Christopher’s reputation and extensive expertise in this area greatly enhances our service offering to clients and underlines our commitment to the global insurance market.’

Despite having a flat year financially, DWF continued its expansion into Scotland with the hire of Andrew Lothian, Anderson Strathern’s former managing partner. Lothain, who led the Scottish outfit for five years till September last year, will head up the firm’s casualty and general insurance practice in Scotland. He advises insurers, self-insured corporates and public bodies in disease, motor and catastrophic injury cases.

Meanwhile, after Legal Business revealed the departure of Olswang former corporate head Fabrizio Carpanini, Dorsey & Whitney announced the firm had hired him to lead its UK and European private equity (PE) practice. Carpanini, who also sat on Olswang’s management and executive committees and led its PE group. Primarily his experience has focused on institutional-facing PE deals, institutional and management buy-outs, as well as development capital and buy-and-build transactions.

Finally, in a busy week for hires, King & Wood Mallesons hired Jones Day partner Jean-Louis Martin to lead its real estate offering in Paris as well as co-head its Europe and Middle East sector group. Alongside Martin, the firm, which has invested strongly in real estate after recruiting a team of lawyers from Eversheds led by William Naunton and Clive Jones, also brought across a three-lawyer team from Jones Day.

Martin covers all aspects of real estate law and investments, with a particular focus on acquisitions and sales of assets, portfolios, property companies and the formation of real estate funds. The team has advises real estate investment funds, institutional investors, sovereign wealth funds as well as French and international sponsors.

michael.west@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

City moves: BLP looks to broaden insurance offering with Clyde & Co’s Quirk

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Strategic recruitment Berwin Leighton PaisnerClyde & Co
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Berwin Leighton Paisner (BLP) has boosted its insurance practice and expanded its regulatory offering by recruiting Clyde & Co’s leading insurance partner Geradline Quirk.

Listed in The Legal 500 as a leading individual for insolvency and restructuring, Quirk brings over 18-years of experience with her to the new role and having been made up to partner in Clyde & Co’s corporate insurance team in 2008.

She will be tasked with improving BLP’s non-contentious insurance and financial services regulatory offerings as she joins its insurance/reinsurance team headed up by Anthony Lennox and Jonathan Sacher.

Quirk’s practice covers UK and EU insurance regulation, particularly focusing on business transfers under Part VII of the Financial Services and Markets Act, solvent schemes of arrangement, and cross-border mergers. She works with both life and non-life insurers as well as reinsurers, brokers and intermediaries with past clients including Euler Hermes, PwC, R&Q, AXA and Enstar.

Commenting on the new hire, Sacher said: ‘Gerry is a market leader within the sector in a number of specialist areas, particularly insurance transfers, and her appointment will play a key role helping us broaden the scope of our capabilities in this field. Her sector experience and reputation will be invaluable in ensuring that we can offer our clients advice across a full range of legal issues relevant to their business.’

michael.west@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

Revolving Doors: US firms kick-on with big hires as Clydes invests Stateside

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Strategic recruitment Clyde & CoCooleySheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton
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As firms move to finalise their lateral hires before the holiday season starts, a string of US hires were wrapped up last week as Cooley brought in Reed Smith’s global head of corporate and securities in a four-partner hire to grow on both sides of the States, while Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton launched an antitrust practice in the City. Meanwhile, UK firm Clyde & Co went in the other direction to grow its US offering.

Cooley launched one of the most ambitious hires in the legal sector last week, as it welcomed a four-partner team from Reed Smith led by that firm’s global head of corporate and securities and chair of its US capital markets group, Yvan-Claude Pierre.

New York-based Pierre, who alone has been involved in more than 250 capital markets offerings and 150 M&A transactions, and corporate and capital market partners Daniel Goldberg and William Haddad made the switch in Manhattan while Reed Smith’s M&A partner Garth Osterman also joined Cooley, arriving at the firm’s San Francisco office. Cooley also made a capital markets hire from Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom with partner Joshua Kaufman joining the firm’s ranks.

The hires follow a rapid expansion of the firm’s corporate and finance teams, with the four-partner arrival bringing to 25 the number of corporate partners who have joined Cooley since 2013. Pierre said: ‘Companies around the world are taking note of Cooley’s incredible momentum as it continues to deliver record-breaking results in tech, life sciences and all things innovation.’

While Cooley’s aggressive opening in London has helped to push its brand into Europe and generate momentum, US rival Sheppard Mullin has employed a low key strategy in the City. Nonetheless, its hire of competition partner Oliver Heinisch last week proved to be something of a coup, with the London lawyer leaving Simmons & Simmons to launch the firm’s antitrust practice in the City.

Well known for his work with Samsung, Heinisch said he was ‘impressed with Sheppard Mullin’s successful national and international growth and expansion in recent years’. Heinisch advises on EU, UK and German competition law with a focus on international cartel and abuse of dominance.

Meanwhile, Clydes expansion in the other direction, as it seeks to bulk out its US practice, continued with the addition of professional liability partner Scott Bertschi in Atlanta. With over two decades of experience, Bertschi arrives from Arnall Golden Gregory with a large number of insurance clients, which he defends in litigation over their coverage to pay-out insurance.

With the firm able to offer Bertschi access to its leading insurance practice servicing the Lloyd’s of London insurance market, the professional liability partner said ‘the firm’s international network uniquely positions me to leverage that expertise in service to my clients’.

He added: ‘I am excited to be joining Clyde & Co at a time of so much change in the legal, regulatory and technology landscapes. Clyde & Co has helped develop many new types of specialty policies now being used across the industry.’

His arrival follows that of insurance partners Vikram Sidhu, Bob Mangino and Owen Carragher in New York over the past 18 months.

tom.moore@legalease.co.uk