DLA Piper has appointed former JP Morgan in-house counsel Julia Gorham as its new employment head in Asia. Gorham joins DLA Piper as a partner in Hong Kong from JP Morgan, where she served as the executive director for litigation and employment in Asia Pacific from 2010. Prior to her in-house practice at JP Morgan, […]
Beijing-headquartered Longan has become the latest Chinese firm to venture into Hong Kong, after launching an office in the special administrative region. The Hong Kong office will be Longan’s second location outside of mainland China, following its Ulaanbaatar base that was established in 2009. The new office is headed by the firm’s chairman Xu Jiali. […]
Rarely do corporate law firms and gangsta rap cross paths, but last week the two temporarily collided as headphone-maker Beats became Apple’s largest-ever acquisition. Beats, co-founded by Californian producer Andre ‘Dr Dre’ Young and music business mogul Jimmy Iovine, instructed West Coast firm Munger Tolles & Olsen on the deal. More surprising is that London-based […]
DWF is to move all 305 London-based staff, including 53 partners, from its two current London sites into the Walkie Talkie on 1 September. The Lawyer revealed that DWF staff would be moving from their current base at 85 King William Street to 20 Fenchurch Street in January (13 January 2014). DWF plans to lease […]
Norton Rose Fulbright has updated its maternity and paternity policies, following a survey of all women who have taken maternity leave from the firm over the past five years. The new policy, which went live on 1 May 2014, sees all London employees who have been at the firm for more than one year receive […]
Clyde & Co has entered the South African market with something of a bang. It has poached two partners from Linklaters’ ally Webber Wentzel to launch in Cape Town. Clydes has a habit of nabbing partners from Linklaters allies; it did the same in Australia Hogan Lovells agrees South African merger with former Eversheds ally […]
The Treasury Solicitor’s department (TSol) spent £2.3m on outsourcing provider Capita between January and March 2014, figures disclosed to The Lawyer reveal. The Government’s in-house legal arm, which handles around 36,400 disputes a year, spent £872,000 on temporary legal staff with Capita Resourcing in January, a figure that dropped to £858,000 in February and £596,000 […]
The consumer insurance market has seen a fierce tussle for territory. Have the mega-firms won or has the war just begun? Insurers sparked an epic land grab a few years ago when they began reducing their panels and putting the squeeze on fees. Meanwhile, added pressure was piling up on firms from regulatory change and the […]
Taylor Wessing has formed an association with South Korean firm DR & AJU, becoming the latest UK firm to make a move into the jurisdiction. The association will give Taylor Wessing access to over 100 lawyers in Korea. DR & AJU is a full-service firm established in 1994 with 120 lawyers including 18 partners. It […]
Unprecedented consolidation in the consumer insurance market has halved the number of key industry players in the UK200, The Lawyer’s research has revealed. Of 22 of the UK200’s key consumer insurance firms active in 2009 only 14 remained in 2013 – and only 11 today. At the end of the 2012/13 financial year, over half […]
Chicago-based law firm Katten Muchin Rosenman has created a dedicated City-based asset management group with the hire of two new partners. The firm has also promoted former Sidley Austin funds partner Barry Breen to head of London financial services. Breen, who joined Katten’s London base from Sidley Austin last year, has hired former Sidley colleague […]
Our new industry leaders’ viewpoint page (p10 in this issue) is going down a storm among readers, not least because our participants refuse to sit on the fence. First, we had Sir Nigel Knowles saying he thought fracking was a good idea, but that the Foreign Office’s idea to introduce new contract sanctions was dangerous. […]