The year 2001 could be seen as the time when Clifford Chance's (CC's) corporate department, for so long in the shadow of its all-powerful finance practice, finally achieved its aim of reaching the front rank.

According to statistics provided by Mergermarket, it was in third place by value of European M&A deals, advising on transactions worth £120bn, just behind Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer (£133bn) and Linklaters (£132bn). And, for the first time, it beat Slaughter and May, which notched up £100bn worth of deals.

If you rank the deals by volume, the firm did even better. Only Linklaters, with 210 deals, handled more than CC, whose 179 deals put it ahead of Freshfields' 166.

There were a number of stand-out deals in 2001 as well.

Arguably the most significant was its role advising Lloyds TSB, after Linklaters was conflicted out, on its failed £19bn merger bid with Abbey National. And the Lloyds-Abbey National deal was one of a string of billion-pound deals.

Key mandates included advising GKN on the £5.4bn merger of its support services arm with Australian group Brambles Industries, acting for US power company Utilicorp on its bid for Midlands Electricity and Sema on its £3.8bn takeover by US group Schlumberger.

CC's performance in this year's M&A tables would have been hard to imagine just a few years ago, when the firm was regarded as a distant second to the M&A might of Freshfields and Linklaters.

But its failed bid to merge with Ashurst Morris Crisp in the mid-90s showed how committed the firm's management was to boosting its corporate strength.

The subsequent improvement, of course, has not happened by chance. The firm's success can be put down to a combination of playing to its strengths in areas such as financial services and private equity, a strategy of targeting specific industry sectors and, not least, supporting strategic practice groups with an aggressive programme of lateral hiring.

Mergermarket's statistics reveal how CC's strength in financial services has provided the backbone for the success of the department. Nearly one in five of its deals – 34 out of 179 – are in this sector, worth a total of £52.4bn.

A typical example of such a deal was advising Liffe on its £555m take-over by Euronext.

CC has also successfully pursued a strategy of targeting different industry sectors and has a wide range of potential sources of work. After financial services, the next most productive sectors in 2001 were the retail sector with 16 deals, the services sector with 15 and the industrial products sector with 14.

This breadth in client base means the firm is well placed to withstand major downturns in activity in certain sectors.

Even in the hard-hit telecoms sector, the firm still managed to handle 11 deals worth a total of £14.5bn in 2001, although this was down from £19bn in 2000.

Another driver of CC's corporate practice is its long-standing strength in private equity work, a sector in which the firm has been well placed to benefit from the globalisation of the buy-out market in the past five years.

Its close relationship with Apax Partners saw it advise on the o528m (£325m) leveraged buy-out of Ericsson Enterprise Solution Channel Business. It was Apax's largest ever deal.

Repeat business from other key clients such as Nomura has also proved a regular source of deals. Deals for Nomura in 2001 included the £1.9bn leveraged acquisition of the Le Meridien Hotels chain from Compass and the £255m acquisition of the Principal Hotels Group.

The firm also advised on the purchase of 1,000 pubs from Bass, a transaction that confirmed Nomura's position as the UK's biggest landlord.

The final reason for CC's success has been its aforementioned lateral hire programme, implemented over the past two years.

Just consider the appointments the firm has made during the past two years.

In August 2000 the firm took on Norton Rose telecoms partner Keith Hyman, who had worked closely with France Telecom. It was believed to be the first time a corporate partner had jumped ship from one 'Club of Eight' firm to another.

The Paris office has been boosted with the arrival of Frederic Peltier and Marcus Billam from Darrois Villey Maillot Brochier in February 2000 and Dominique Bompoint from Bredin Prat in February 2001.

Stibbe Simont Monahan Duhot partners Tom de Waard and Hector de Beaufort meanwhile joined the Brussels office in February 2000.

And in New York, Kevin O'Mara joined from Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld in October 2000.

Looking at the Mergermarket statistics, it would appear that the programme has already paid significant dividends.

For example, in his first year at the firm, Peltier worked on six deals worth a total of £5bn, while Billam handled four deals worth a total of £4.6bn.

The new arrivals have a tough standard to follow, however.

The top individual by number of deals in 2001 was David Pearson, who handled deals worth £12.1bn, including the Apax-Ericsson and Nomura-Le Meridien Hotels deal.

Roberto Cappelli – one of the founders of Grimaldi e Asociati, the top-ranked Milan firm that merged with CC in November 2000 – also handled eight deals, worth a total of £1.8bn.

In third was Adam Signy, the firm's head of investment banking, with seven deals worth £2.8bn.

For CC's team the challenge now is to build on the momentum established in 2001 and to prove that it was not a one-off.