German gas giant Linde has appointed a new head of legal, swiping Johnson & Johnson assistant general counsel Christian Rau to replace outgoing chief Nick Deeming.

Rau is to join the gas and engineering giant as chief legal officer at the beginning of July having spent eight years at Johnson & Johnson.

At Johnson & Johnson, Rau also held roles including head of legal for Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Prior to that he was a lawyer at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer. At Linde he will report to chief executive Wolfgang Reitzler.

Deeming, who is set to leave his position at the end of the month, will stay on at Linde as a consultant until September. He is yet to confirm his next destination but told Legal Week that he is looking for 'new challenges'.

Deeming joined legacy company BOC in 2001 and announced that he was to leave Linde in early June. He led a four-month review of the company's legal advisers after BOC was taken over in a £7.5bn deal by Linde last year, which saw DLA Piper, Linklaters, Hengeler Mueller and Simpson Thacher & Bartlett appointed to the company's first-ever formal panel.

Rau's appointment comes as Linde readies itself to shake up its compliance function, setting up a new code of ethics and an 'integrity' hotline. Linde is the latest in a string of German companies to tighten up on regulatory and compliance issues in the wake of last year's Siemens bribery scandal.