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  • April 13, 2011 |

    Kirkland boosts London base with Shearman partner hire

    Kirkland & Ellis has strengthened its City office with the addition of a partner from Shearman & Sterling. Shearman capital markets partner Ward McKimm (pictured) is understood to have handed in his notice yesterday (12 April), with the intention of joining US rival Kirkland.

    1 minute read

  • April 11, 2011 |

    Lawyers raise concerns over impact of Vickers' banking reform proposals

    City lawyers have reacted critically to the Vickers report's proposals for reform of the UK banking sector, highlighting the potentially damaging impact on the City's status as a global banking hub. Key proposals contained within the interim report from the Independent Commission on Banking (ICB) include the suggestion that UK banks should ring-fence their retail divisions from their investment banking arms and that there should be increased capital requirements for "systemically important banks".

    1 minute read

  • April 6, 2011 |

    Partnership ranks at top UK law firms still in flux, research shows

    DLA Piper has seen more partners resign from its limited liability partnership (LLP) since January 2010 than any other top 10 firm, according to Legal Week research that shows the extent to which leading law firms are continuing to reshape their partnerships. Filings with Companies House show DLA Piper has seen 75 partners resign from its international LLP since January 2010, of which 60 have left the firm entirely. Of the remaining 15, eight have stayed with DLA in non-partner roles, with seven set to rejoin the LLP on 1 May when the merger with former Australian alliance partner DLA Phillips Fox takes effect.

    1 minute read

  • April 1, 2011 |

    Three Ashurst US securities partners to depart firm's London office

    Ashurst is set to see all three of its London-based US securities partners leave the firm. Corporate partners Daniel Bushner, Eric Stuart and Marie Elena Angulo have handed in their notice, with the departures first reported on legal website RollonFriday earlier this morning (1 April). A partner at the firm said Ashurst intended to replace the trio with a team of lateral hires, stating that they were in 'advanced talks' with at least two partners from a rival firm.

    1 minute read

  • March 30, 2011 |

    Top private equity advisers line up on £480m Chiswick Park office sale

    A raft of international law firms have advised on buyout house The Blackstone Group's £480m acquisition of the Chiswick Park office development in West London. Simpson Thacher & Bartlett and City firm Herbert Smith were jointly instructed by Blackstone on the deal, with SJ Berwin and Ashurst advising the seller, Chiswick Park Unit Trust.

    1 minute read

  • March 29, 2011 |

    Back at the gate - the challenges ahead for private equity

    A few weeks ago news got out that Bain Capital, one of the world's leading private equity firms, was holding interviews for junior investment professionals a month earlier than usual. Bain's competitors, which include Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co (KKR) and The Blackstone Group, moved quickly, bringing forward their pre-scheduled cocktail party recruiting events. This was not a surprising development. Five years ago private equity houses often did their entry-level hiring in September. During the boom, such intakes kept drifting earlier into the year as rivals jostled to secure the best aspiring deal-doers.

    1 minute read

  • March 29, 2011 |

    Tiers for jeers - the mid-tier gets an unfairly bad press

    What is it with the mid-tier, that much-maligned but ill-defined group of law firms that always gets it in the neck from consultants, pundits and journalists? Written off whatever the conditions of the day, observers of the legal industry will usually be told this breed will soon be history as an over-supplied and fragmented market is carved up between industry leaders and nimble boutiques. While there is a grain of truth here - which we'll get to later - it's usually stretched to the point of woolly nonsense delivered with shaky reference to the facts. For a start, who is this group supposed to be? Taken literally you could make a solid case that any firm south of Slaughter and May is mid-tier, though that isn't usually what is meant. Smaller than Ashurst, maybe? Consensus starts to break down. Outside the top 50? Take your pick. There are a bewilderingly large number of mid-tiers out there. In an industry obsessed by relative status, groups are defined as much by what you're not - so the mid-tier is, for many a firm, someone else.

    1 minute read

  • March 23, 2011 |

    Paying the piper - can law firms' love affair with banks survive a series of tough panel reviews?

    Can City law firms' love affair with leading banks survive a bruising round of adviser reviews? Sofia Lind and Friederike Heine report

    1 minute read

  • March 23, 2011 |

    Deutsche expands adviser line-up and sets up Berlin 'near-shoring' arm

    Deutsche Bank has expanded the number of external law firms with which it has formal relationships, with the news coming as the bank's in-house legal team prepares to set up its own low-cost legal processing centre in Berlin. The German-based investment bank has added Hogan Lovells, Simmons & Simmons, CMS Cameron McKenna and Ashurst to its EMEA roster of preferred legal advisers, with Slaughter and May, Clifford Chance, Linklaters, Allen & Overy, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and White & Case all retaining spots. A fifth firm has also won a first-time appointment.

    1 minute read

  • March 23, 2011 |

    Olswang extends alternative billing menu to all clients

    Olswang has rolled out an alternative pricing menu across its entire client base, as the firm continues to move away from traditional hourly billing rates. The firm has issued all clients with a menu of eight alternative billing options, with the intention of moving away from hourly rates where possible. The move comes after the firm devised the pricing menu in May last year, initially targeting its top 150 clients.

    1 minute read