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Natural selection: Darwin’s evolution to DLA Piper senior partner ‘only fitting’
DLA Piper has elected firm veteran Andrew Darwin its new senior partner after last year’s surprise departure of Juan Picón sparked the firm’s first contested senior partner election in a decade.
Darwin has been at DLA his entire career since joining in 1981, and previously held management roles within the firm including chief operating officer, head of corporate, and managing partner in the UK and Australia. He beat London-based international corporate head Bob Bishop and corporate partner John Hayes to the role following 10 days of hustings by the three finalists .
Darwin (pictured), who was seen as the frontrunner throughout the election process, said he was focused on the future of the firm and ensuring it built on its platform: ‘It is a great honour for me to be elected senior partner. I have spent my whole working career at the firm and I am very proud to have played a key role in the development of the global law firm it is today.’
DLA co-chief executive Simon Levine said Darwin was ‘absolutely the right person’ for the role: ‘Andrew’s dedication to, and belief in, DLA Piper is unquestionable and it is only fitting that his career has culminated in being appointed as senior partner.’
Darwin’s term is effective immediately, replacing interim senior partner Janet Legrand. He is also nominated as co-chairman for the global board. The firm held a two-stage senior partner election process, which initially had eight candidates, following Picón’s departure for Latham & Watkins less than two years into his term. Darwin’s experience and knowledge was seen as a suitable counter to the relative instability caused by Picón’s resignation.
The other five candidates were Brussels competition partner Bertold Bär-Bouyssiere, Paris employment partner Bijan Eghbal, Madrid corporate partner Iñigo Gomez-Jordana, London’s finance partner Charles Morrison and Iife sciences co-chair Bonella Ramsay.
Picón, who first joined DLA in 2006 from Squire, Sanders & Dempsey, had been elected senior partner in March 2016 after running uncontested. He replaced long-time leader Sir Nigel Knowles , who last year joined DWF to become its chair.
Picón was one of DLA’s biggest billers and during his time he strengthened the firm’s relationship with Vodafone after being instructed on its €7.2bn acquisition of Spanish broadband company Ono. His move to the highest-grossing firm in the world, Latham, from the one that used to hold that position was fuelled by his desire to spend more time in his native Spain.
Hamish.mcnicol@legalease.co.uk
Deal watch: DLA Piper and Addleshaws advise on Carillion fire sale as US and UK firms pick up major mandates
DLA Piper and Addleshaw Goddard have won roles advising on the sale of part of recently-collapsed Carillion’s business while Watson Farley & Williams (WFW), Allen & Overy (A&O), Weil, Gotshal & Manges, Paul Hastings and Kirkland & Ellis all picked up major deals this week.
Addleshaw Goddard advised engineering and construction company J Murphy & Sons on its acquisition of Carillion’s UK power framework business for an undisclosed sum. The deal sees Murphy take Carillion’s position on National Grid’s electricity overhead lines, substation and underground cable framework contracts, supporting replacement and refurbishment schemes on transmission networks across England and Wales.
Murphy, a private infrastructure company which employs more than 3,000 engineers, will also take on 22 former Carillion employees as part of the transaction. The acquisition follows Carillion’s liquidation in January after talks between the Wolverhampton-headquartered company, its creditors and the government failed to reach a deal on its £1.5bn liabilities, including £900m in debt.
The Addleshaw Goddard team was led by Manchester-based corporate partner Shelley McGivern. She declined to comment further.
DLA Piper, meanwhile, acted for the Official Receiver for Carillion. The firm declined to comment further or name who led from its side. Dentons’ restructuring partners Nigel Barnett and Neil Griffiths have also been advising the liquidator since Carillion’s collapse.
Meanwhile, a cluster of firms won advisory roles on Blackburn-based petrol store retailer EG Group’s purchase of Kroger’s convenience store business for $2.15bn. As a result of the acquisition, which is expected to close in the first quarter of Kroger’s fiscal year, EG Group will establish a North American headquarters in Cincinnati, the city where Kroger was founded.
Magic Circle firm A&O is the main legal adviser to EG Group, with a team consisting of partners William Schwitter and Jeffrey Pellegrino. US outfit Kirkland & Ellis also acted for EG Group on financing aspects of the deal, led by partner Neel Sachdev.
Sachdev told Legal Business: ‘It was a real privilege to help EG put in place their new financing and to support their growth strategy through acquisitions, including the Kroger deal.’
Weil provided legal support to Kroger, with a team headed by New York corporate partner Michael Aiello. He was supported by fellow corporate partner Matthew Gilroy, technology partner Michael Epstein, tax partner Kenneth Heitner, executive compensation and benefits partner Paul Wessel, real estate partner Philip Rosen, antitrust partner Jeffrey Perry and environmental partner Annemargaret Connolly.
Paul Hastings advised EG Group on real estate due diligence for the transaction, with a team led by real estate partner Robert Keane alongside corporate partner Robert Miller.
Energy and transport specialist WFW has racked up two significant real estate deals for a combined value of over £860m, after advising longstanding client Frasers Group on its £174.6m acquisition of Farnborough Business Park as well as its £686m buyout of a portfolio of four other UK business parks.
The Farnborough Business Park acquisition was a joint venture between Frasers Centrepoint and Frasers Commercial Trust. The park comprises of 14 commercial buildings and has a net lettable area of 555,000 sq. ft. The portfolio buyout included parks in Reading, Basingstoke, Camberley and Glasgow.
Gowling WLG advised Farnborough Business Park on the sale, while Gibson Dunn & Crutcher represented the seller of the four-park portfolio.
WFW’s team on both acquisitions was led by corporate partner Felicity Jones, who said the portfolio acquisition had a tight timeframe, which was agreed and signed in under four weeks. She added: ‘Having had a long term relationship with the hospitality arm of Frasers, we were especially pleased to work with their commercial arm on their expansion into the UK. It also provided a good opportunity to complement our existing expertise in the business park area.’
Also acting on the acquisitions for WFW was corporate partner Dearbhla Quigley, tax partner Tom Jarvis, real estate partners Simon Folley and Hetan Ganatra and planning and environment partner Nick Walker.
And then there were three: DLA Piper senior partner finalists named
DLA Piper’s first senior partner contest in a decade is down to three candidates after the first round of voting closed on Friday (26 January).
London-based international corporate head Bob Bishop, emerging markets managing director Andrew Darwin, and corporate partner Jon Hayes now face 10 days of hustings before the firm’s new senior partner is announced on 12 February.
The trio advanced to the second round from a large pool of eight partners who were vying for the position following last year’s surprise departure of Juan Picón to Latham & Watkins.
Brussels competition partner Bertold Bär-Bouyssiere, Paris employment partner Bijan Eghbal, and Madrid corporate partner Iñigo Gomez-Jordana missed out alongside London’s finance partner Charles Morrison and Iife sciences co-chair Bonella Ramsay.
Darwin and Hayes were both strongly tipped to make the second round, while Bishop was also seen as a strong candidate. Ramsay, the only female candidate, was considered a good chance for a spot in the final three, given her history working alongside co-chief executive Simon Levine after the pair left Dentons for DLA in 2005 as part of an eye-catching 11-partner switch.
The high-profile veteran Darwin is a member of the firm’s global board and was formerly the firm’s chief operating officer, head of corporate, and managing partner in the UK and Australia. A former DLA Piper partner said Darwin’s experience and knowledge of the firm could provide a suitable counter to the relative period of instability caused by Picón’s short tenure and resignation.
Meanwhile Hayes, a former Linklaters corporate partner on DLA’s international board, was described as ‘sensible and a class act’. Bishop is co-chair of the global corporate group and holds the same role for its M&A practice.
The firm is deploying a single transferable vote system, split into two stages because of the large number of candidates. The most popular three candidates from the first round of votes progressed to the second stage.
Picón, who first joined DLA in 2006 from Squire, Sanders & Dempsey, had been elected senior partner in March 2016 after running uncontested. He replaced long-time leader Sir Nigel Knowles , who last year joined DWF to become its chair.
Picón was one of DLA’s biggest billers and during his time he strengthened the firm’s relationship with Vodafone after being instructed on its €7.2bn acquisition of Spanish broadband company Ono. His move to the highest-grossing firm in the world, Latham, from the one that used to hold that position was fuelled by his desire to spend more time in his native Spain.
hamish.mcnicol@legalease.co.uk
‘Enormous’ £75.5m currency boost flatters DLA Piper LLP accounts
The dramatic impact of currency markets during the 2016/17 period has significantly bolstered another law firm’s LLP accounts, with the latest beneficiary, DLA Piper International, adding £75.5m to its top line on the back of exchange rate movements last year.
This currency boost accounted for 69% of the international (non-US) revenue improvement for the year ending 30 April 2017, which was up £109.3m to £876.8m. Helped in no small part by this, profit rose to £304.4m from £260.8m, even as operating costs soared 13% to £568.6m – of which £45.9m of the £65.8m increase was again attributed to currency changes.
Chief financial officer Paul Edwards said it had been a good year for the firm, but cautioned against reading too much into any firm’s accounts from that period: ‘Currency played an enormous, enormous part in bolstering results.’
The firm’s director of finance, Claire Chellam, added: ‘In previous years our results have not benefited from exchange and it’s appeared that we’ve had a decrease, this year they are very much flattered by the weakening of the sterling and the currency movements.’
Both maintained the firm had recorded a good financial performance despite this, however: sterling accounts for 33% of the business, meaning exchange rate fluctuations can have a big impact on the headline numbers which are quoted in sterling. Stripping out the currency movements, DLA Piper’s revenue rose £33.8m, an increase of 4%. In real terms, average profit per partner increased 2%.
Edwards said the firm paid its partners in their local currency, and the finance team had introduced a hedging system 10 years ago to try and manage for exchange rate movements: ‘We have to look at what our mismatch is at the start of the year, between where profits are being generated and being remunerated, and if we’ve got a mismatch in the currency, then we’ll take a hedge on that.’
Salaries and other investments were said to have led to the increase in operating costs not attributed to currency movements. Salaries in 2016/17 rose 15% to £275.6m. Edwards said pay pressures were becoming more acute in the legal sector because of the relative strength of the dollar and improved activity levels generating demand for talent.
Key management personnel, which includes the senior partner, managing partner, members of the executive committee, international practice group heads, country managing partners and service directors took home a total of £36.1m, up from £34.2m. Total staff numbers at the firm rose slightly to 4,955 from 4,916, of which 2,026 were fee earners – down from 2,044 last year.
The firm said most of its regions experienced growth, most notably in Europe where revenue increased £24.4m, or 7%. The UK lagged with growth below 2%, Chellam said.
‘The UK has been very busy and all the Brexit doom-and-gloom, which people talk about, has not cut in and I don’t think it will cut in through the early part of 2018,’ Edwards said.
‘Maybe we’ll get a bit more uncertainty as the end-of-year comes but I’m looking to deliver another good set of results this year.’
hamish.mcnicol@legalease.co.uk
On your marks: eight DLA Piper partners line up in tight senior partner race
A large pool of partners have entered DLA Piper’s first contested senior partner race in a decade following last year’s surprise departure of Juan Picón to Latham & Watkins.
Eight partners, including five from London, will vie to replace Picón in a two-stage election process which will whittle the candidates down to the most popular three before the new senior partner is announced 12 February.
Brussels competition partner Bertold Bär-Bouyssiere, Paris employment partner Bijan Eghbal, and Madrid corporate partner Iñigo Gomez-Jordana join London’s international corporate head Bob Bishop, emerging markets managing director Andrew Darwin, corporate partner and board member Jon Hayes, finance partner Charles Morrison and Iife sciences co-chair Bonella Ramsay in the election battle.
DLA Piper interim senior partner Janet Legrand said the wide variety of practice backgrounds and jurisdictions in the group reflected the strength and depth of the business: ‘This is the firm’s first contested election for senior partner in a decade and we are very fortunate to have such a high level of interest with eight experienced partners who wish to be considered for this important leadership role.’
The firm will deploy a single transferable vote system, split into two stages because of the large number of candidates. The most popular three candidates from the first round of votes will progress to the second stage, which will involve 10 days of hustings before a second vote.
Veteran Darwin has the highest profile of those running, being a member of the firm’s global board and was formerly the firm’s chief operating officer, head of corporate, and managing partner in the UK and Australia.
A former DLA Piper partner said Darwin’s experience and knowledge of the firm could provide a suitable counter to the relative period of instability caused by Picón’s short tenure and resignation. Meanwhile Hayes, a former Linklaters corporate partner on DLA’s international board, was described as ‘sensible and a class act’.
Otherwise Bär-Bouyssiere is also on the international board, while Bishop is co-chair of the global corporate group and holds the same role for its M&A practice and Morrison previously led the firm’s finance and projects practice. Ramsay heads the IP team in London and has worked with co-chief executive Simon Levine for a long time, with the pair both leaving Dentons for DLA in 2005 as part of an eye-catching 11-partner team switch.
Picón, who first joined DLA in 2006 from Squire, Sanders & Dempsey, had been elected senior partner in March 2016 after running uncontested. He replaced long-time leader Sir Nigel Knowles, who last year joined DWF to become its chair.
Picón was one of DLA’s biggest billers and during his time he strengthened the firm’s relationship with Vodafone after being instructed on its €7.2bn acquisition of Spanish broadband company Ono. His move to the highest-grossing firm in the world, Latham, from the one that used to hold that position was fuelled by his desire to spend more time in his native Spain.
Former Spanish president José Maria Aznar also recently stepped down as senior advisor to DLA Piper’s global board, and is widely tipped to join Picón at Latham & Watkins.
hamish.mcnicol@legalease.co.uk
DLA Piper chief Picón joins Latham in shock move as Ropes names first female chair
In a move that set tongues wagging on both sides of the pond, DLA Piper senior partner and global co-chair Juan Picón is to depart for Latham & Watkins, while Ropes & Gray has selected its first-ever female chair to replace the long-serving Bradford Malt.
Picón’s move to the highest-grossing firm in the world from the one that used to hold that position was fuelled by his desire to spend more time in his native Spain. As such, Picón will take over the role of Latham’s managing partner in the country following the retirement of predecessor José Luis Blanco. He joins at the end of the year from DLA’s Madrid office, bringing corporate partners Ignacio Gómez-Sancha and José Antonio Sánchez-Dafos with him.
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‘Collateral damage’: Profession gets a stark wake-up call on tech security in wake of crippling DLA cyber assault
Kathryn McCann assesses the impact of the cyber attack on DLA and the wider legal market
For years, the possibility of a major cyber attack on a leading law firm has been discussed. Inevitably, it finally materialised. On 27 June DLA Piper was crippled for days after the global giant’s systems were hit by what the firm terms a ‘particularly sophisticated strain of malware’. (In cyber jargon, malware is malicious software designed to disrupt, damage or gain access to computer systems.)
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He’s back – DWF signs up Sir Nigel Knowles as chair in rare c-suite shuffle for the profession
It remains extremely rare for law firm leaders to re-emerge at another practice, but then Sir Nigel Knowles has always been one to do things his own way in more than 30 years in the profession.
Knowles today (7 September) announced his return to law after retiring last year from the global giant DLA Piper to become chair of DWF, an ambitious UK player that has long modelled itself on Knowles’ former parish.
Knowles, who spearheaded DLA’s meteoric yet unlikely rise from regional upstart to become one of the world’s largest law firms, assumed the position on 1 September to replace long-serving Alan Benzie as DWF’s chair. Though it remains a part-time appointment, Knowles will sit on DWF’s board.
Knowles told Legal Business: ‘My enthusiasm and desire to contribute to an overall achievement have not diminished. But the strategy of DWF is not the strategy of DLA Piper. I am not here to turn DWF into the next DLA. DWF has a very different view of life, it’s come through the middle of the financial crisis with lots of great people and there’s a lot to achieve.’
DWF chief executive and managing partner Andrew Leaitherland described Knowles’ appointment as ‘the perfect succession’.
‘One of the key attractions with Nigel is his ability to give strategic insight and input,’ Leaitherland added. ‘Not just his 30-plus years’ experience in the legal sector, but also the things he’s been doing since then in terms of legal technology. Having a chairman who can be a mentor and someone you learn from is absolutely valuable. He’s not just had the t-shirt, he’s worn it several times.’
Knowles said that talks with Leaitherland about a return to legal practice began with ‘good constructive discussions’ in the last six months.
A member of the ultra-select club of commercial lawyers to have received a knighthood, Knowles was a key figure in DLA securing a transatlantic tie-up in 2005 with US firms Piper Rudnick and Gray Cary Ware & Freidenrich.
In his time the iconoclastic Knowles built a reputation as one of the most forward-thinking and admired law firm leaders in the UK, a reputation that saw him in 2015 handed the outstanding individual achievement award to mark the 25th year anniversary of Legal Business.
Knowles stepped down as head of DLA’s international arm at the end of 2014 with Simon Levine succeeding him as co-chief executive.
DWF, meanwhile, has been in acquisition mode in 2017. In June 2017, the 1,250-lawyer firm picked up legal costs business NeoLaw to add to its 36-strong in-house costs department, and also launched a four-lawyer branch in Singapore.
Revolving doors: DLA, Kirkland and Pinsents bring in partners as firms gear up for the crucial post-summer period
With August drawing to a close, London’s simmering lateral hire market is already heating up again with DLA Piper, Pinsent Masons, Kirkland & Ellis and Debevoise & Plimpton among the firms bringing in new partners.
At DLA Piper, the firm’s finance team made its first hires since Maurice Allen’s appointment in March as a consultant, appointing ex-Kirkland & Ellis and Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher partner Philip Crump in London and Kirkland partner Doug Murning.
The appointment of the high-profile veteran Allen was touted as part of a bid to push DLA’s City finance practice up the food chain. Crump’s practice covers traditional sponsor and lender side leveraged finance as well as special situations and private deals for alternative credit providers. Murning, who will initially split his time between London and Hong Kong, is focused on leveraged finance and restructuring.
DLA’s international head of finance and projects Martin Bartlam said: ‘Phil is extremely knowledgeable and highly thought of in the leverage finance market. Doug is a well-reputed finance lawyer who provides immense energy, enabling us to further service the growing markets in Europe and Asia.’
Kirkland, meanwhile, was characteristically active in the transfer market through August, hiring Ropes & Gray investment funds specialist Anand Damodaran. The appointment adds to a striking recent run of recruitment between the two US leaders, unquestionably two of the most successful and ambitious US firms bred outside of New York over the last decade. Damodaran is the sixth partner Kirkland has taken from Ropes in the last two weeks following the hire of a five-partner investigations and government enforcement team from Ropes’ offices in the US, UK and Asia. The team compromised Chicago managing partner and global anti-corruption co-chair Asheesh Goel and Zachary Brez. Chicago anti-corruption partner Kim Nemirow, London-based Marcus Thompson and Cori Lable in Hong Kong made up the remainder of the group.
Pinsents also made a double City hire, boosting its corporate finance practice with Julian Stanier and Gareth Jones from Berwin Leighton Paisner (BLP), a duo specialising in advising investment banks, corporate brokers and other intermediaries. Recent work includes acting for BCA Marketplace (formerly Haversham) on its £1.2bn reverse takeover and Sanne Group on its IPO.
Elsewhere, Debevoise has hired Legal 500-ranked insurance transactional and regulatory lawyer Clare Swirski from Clifford Chance in London. The New York-bred law firm has long been established as one of the US’s most prominent industry specialists in the insurance sector.
Debevoise presiding partner Michael Blair said Swirski would be advising some of the firm’s largest institutional clients. He added: ‘Our insurance practice is centred on strong teams in key financial centres, which we have reinforced in recent times with promotions in Hong Kong and London. The arrival of Clare is the latest step in that strategy, bringing as she does a wealth of experience and a deserved reputation as one of the sharpest lawyers in the market.’
Further afield, Dentons has made another hire from Baker McKenzie in its recently-launched Amsterdam branch, bringing in corporate partner Kuif Klein Wassink. The firm had only just recruited a four-lawyer team to launch its tax practice in the city. Dentons, which operates as Dentons Boekel in the Netherlands, also hired two partners from Clifford Chance’s energy team – David Griston in Amsterdam and Petr Zákoucký in Prague.
A clearer test of the appetite for top level European recruitment will emerge in September, but indications so far are that major firms are shrugging off concerns over the City and the UK economy to keep spending.