Legal Week

June 16, 2009 | International Edition

On Monday 8 June Legal Week reported that the parent company of top UK law school BPP had accepted a £303.5m takeover offer from US education provider Apollo. The move will be closely watched by the legal profession as it effectively means that a US company has bought degree-awarding powers in the UK (BPP is the only private company in the UK to hold such powers). The College of Law, the largest law school in Britain, also has degree-awarding powers, but it is a charity.

By Legal Week

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June 16, 2009 | International Edition

National firm Cobbetts has posted a 16% drop in fee income for the last financial year. The firm saw fee income fall to £48.5m for 2008-09 from £58m the previous year, a dip of 16.3%.

By Legal Week

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June 16, 2009 | International Edition

Gibson Dunn & Crutcher is set to launch an office in Brazil - joining the growing ranks of law firms with bases in Sao Paulo. The firm is set to relocate one of the three New York-based co-chairs of its Latin America practice group, Lisa Alfaro, to head the new office, which will launch as soon as it receives a licence.

By Legal Week

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June 16, 2009 | International Edition

General Motors has paid out more than $80m (£49m) over the past six months to the three firms advising on the troubled automaker's Chapter 11 case, reports the Am Law Daily. Weil Gotshal & Manges, Jenner & Block and Honigman Miller Schwartz and Cohn have all filed their applications for employment as counsel to GM. As lead bankruptcy counsel, Weil Gotshal has the lion's share of the billings at more than $54m (£33m) - roughly equivalent to the $55m that Weil billed Lehman Brothers between September 2008 and January 2009.

By Legal Week

2 minute read

June 16, 2009 | International Edition

Simmons & Simmons has announced its new partner promotions, with the firm making up just four following a partnership vote last night (16 June). The promotions, which were pushed back by several months, mark a significant drop on last year's round, when the firm made up 18 new partners.

By Legal Week

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June 16, 2009 | International Edition

Pinsent Masons has added a Dubai corporate head as the firm bids to boost its Gulf presence. Birmingham-based partner Alan Wood has transferred to the emirate to head up the local corporate team, with a brief to expand the firm's capabilities in the region. The firm has not previously had a local leader of the group, which was launched in June 2008 and until now consisted of just two associates.

By Legal Week

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June 16, 2009 | International Edition

The first hearing has taken place in the case against two lawyers accused of insider trading by the Financial Services Authority, marking the fifth criminal prosecution for insider trading brought by the regulatory body in the last 18 months. Former Dorsey & Whitney corporate partner Andrew Rimmington and former McDermott Will & Emery partner Michael McFall - along with the former financial director of Neutec Pharma, Peter King - have been charged with insider dealing relating to Novartis's 2006 takeover of Neutec.

By Legal Week

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June 16, 2009 | International Edition

Leading Finnish law firm Hannes Snellman is in the process of closing its Beijing and Shanghai offices, making it the first foreign firm to pull out of China in the wake of the global economic slowdown. Tomas Holmberg, a Helsinki partner heavily involved with Hannes Snellman's China practice, said the weakening economy had led the 250-lawyer law firm to narrow its international strategy and focus more on the Scandinavia and Russia markets. "In challenging times like these, you have to make decisions about where to deploy your resources," he said.

By Legal Week

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June 16, 2009 | International Edition

Hammonds' partnership has completed the multimillion-pound sell-off of debt litigation practice Drydens. Drydens, which was set up in 1984 as a unit within Hammonds and spun off in 2003 as a separate law firm headed up by former Hammonds assistant Rachael Charmbury, has been sold to insolvency practitioner Philip Holden for several millions of pounds. The sale was completed last week (12 June) after the business - which turns over approximately £7m a year - was put up for sale in February.

By Legal Week

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June 15, 2009 | International Edition

Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer has lost a four-lawyer team in Berlin with the departure of public procurement partner Friedrich Ludwig Hausmann to K&L Gates. Hausmann will join the US firm along with principal associate Annette Mutschler-Siebert - who joins as counsel - and two other associates. Hausmann has been with the magic circle firm since 1996, making partner in 2002. He and his team advise on public procurement and public private partnerships (PPPs) as well as antitrust, state aid and trade.

By Legal Week

2 minute read