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  • January 26, 2011 |

    Weil recruits new UK restructuring chief with Jones Day London hire

    Weil Gotshal & Manges has made its second London hire in a month with the addition of Jones Day restructuring head Adam Plainer. Plainer is joining Weil as practice head of the US firm's UK business finance and restructuring practice, which currently comprises just one partner, Dominic McCahill. Plainer, who has been handed a remit to build up the practice, advises on a wide range of matters from debtors counsel to insolvency, financial restructurings and distressed M&A. His clients include Honda and Ennstone.

    1 minute read

  • January 26, 2011 |

    Ashurst keeps on 21 of 22 NQ lawyers in March trainee intake

    Ashurst is to retain 95% of its March trainee intake - significantly more than the firm kept on last year. The top 10 City firm has offered 21 of the 22 trainees due to qualify in March positions on qualification, with all of these accepting the offer. The 95% retention rate marks a significant improvement on the March 2010 round, when Ashurst only made offers to 14 of the 22-strong intake (64%). This figure increased to 84% in September 2010 when the firm kept on 26 of its 31 qualifiers.

    1 minute read

  • January 25, 2011 |

    A&O, Dickson Minto and Ashurst lead on gambling tech company buyout

    A trio of City firms have won roles advising on the £208m management buyout of gambling technology provider OpenBet backed by London private equity house Vitruvian partners. The deal saw OpenBet, which is one of the leading software providers in the e-gaming and online betting arena, sold by digital pay TV provider NDS.

    1 minute read

  • January 25, 2011 |

    Russia and Ukraine: Happily single?

    It was a grim morning in November 2008 when Andrey Goltsblat, managing partner of leading Russian law firm Pepeliaev Goltsblat & Partners (PGP), set out for one of the most difficult meetings of his 20-year career. Moscow was already deep in the grip of winter, the streets buried beneath inches of snow. But it wasn't the weather that troubled Goltsblat as he arrived at the firm's premises and headed to the office he shared with Sergey Pepeliaev, the firm's senior partner. Goltsblat had a dramatic announcement to make: he was leaving the business they'd spent the last two decades building together. And he was taking half the firm with him. Neither man will talk about exactly what was said in that meeting - Pepeliaev would only describe his reaction as "appropriate" - but it's safe to say that Goltsblat's news didn't go down well. In one fell swoop, nine partners and a full 70 lawyers - PGP's entire corporate practice and the firm's heads of real estate, dispute resolution and employment - left to join UK firm Berwin Leighton Paisner (BLP).

    1 minute read

  • January 25, 2011 |

    50 hours of controversy - what modern partnership looks like

    Usually, I have a pretty good sense of which articles on legalweek.com will garner attention, but I confess I didn't foresee a low-key article about Ashurst articulating an expectation that partners should be doing at least 50 hours of work a week gaining the audience it did. In many ways the stance, outlined in a 15-second burst at the firm's partnership conference last November, would seem an entirely innocuous statement of fact for those taking on a gig currently paying £362,000 to £940,000 a year.

    1 minute read

  • January 21, 2011 |

    Weil Gotshal hires former Ashurst partner for London finance group

    Weil Gotshal & Manges is to strengthen its City finance practice with the hire of former Ashurst banking partner James Hogben. Hogben, who stepped down from Ashurst's partnership in March 2010, is set to join Weil next week (23 January). He specialises in general banking law and has particular expertise in cross-border leveraged finance and acquisition finance transactions. At Weil, Hogben will work alongside London finance head Jacky Kelly and structured finance partner Steven Ong.

    1 minute read

  • January 19, 2011 |

    Ashurst ushers in 50-hour week benchmark for partners

    Ashurst has upped the number of hours partners must commit to the firm, with all partners now formally obliged to carry out at least 50 hours of firm-related work each week. Partners must spend the equivalent of 10 hours each weekday on either billable client work or other firm-related activities - over 40% more than was previously required.

    1 minute read

  • January 18, 2011 |

    Simmons corporate team: still looking for a place of its own

    Simmons & Simmons' corporate practice has long been viewed as the struggling child in a family of high performers in finance and litigation. Ask City rivals about its corporate performance and you often you get the same answer: Simmons is a great firm full of really good lawyers, but it is inexplicably failing to translate its strengths into a more substantial corporate practice.

    1 minute read

  • January 18, 2011 |

    Freshfields and Cravath win roles as medical co makes £7bn takeover bid

    Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and Cravath Swaine & Moore have picked up lead roles on US medical giant Johnson & Johnson's attempted £7bn bid for Smith & Nephew. Freshfields has been fielding a team led by corporate partners Barry O'Brien and Ben Spiers advising longstanding client Smith & Nephew, which has not formally confirmed or denied this month's reported takeover approach.

    1 minute read

  • January 18, 2011 |

    Partners expect 2011 to be a growth year

    City partners are shrugging off concerns about the eurozone and domestic spending cuts to face 2011 in a generally upbeat mood, with nine out of 10 law firms expecting revenue growth over the year. Legal Week's quarterly business confidence survey found that nine out of 10 partners (90%) expect revenues at their own firm to grow over the next 12 months, with 88% expecting revenues across the top 50 as a whole to increase.

    1 minute read