Reed Smith has snared rated life sciences co-head Paule Drouault-Gardrat and a two-lawyer team from the Paris arm of Bird & Bird.

Drouault-Gardrat will join the US firm's local office as a partner in the life sciences team, bringing with her senior associate Juliette Peterka and associate Julie Gottenberg.

Drouault-Gardrat is dual-qualified as a pharmacist and a lawyer and joined Bird & Bird from Lovells' Paris office in 2002. She has previously spent 13 years working in-house in the pharmaceutical industry, firstly at Sanofi and then as general counsel of Laboratoires Debat.

Drouault-Gardrat advises on contentious and non-contentious issues in the life sciences sector with a particular focus on intellectual property and product liability work.

Following her move, she will rejoin former Bird & Bird life science partners John Wilkinson and Nicola Maguire, who also quit the London-based firm for Reed Smith in 2005. Her arrival boosts Reed Smith's Paris presence to 11 partners.

Commenting on her appointment, Drouault-Gardrat said: "Reed Smith's outstanding strength in the life sciences sector, coupled with [an] outstanding healthcare practice in the US, makes the firm a particularly attractive proposition for the future growth of my practice."

The hire of Drouault-Gardrat comes after Reed Smith last year appointed Gerard Sicsic as a partner in its Paris office, handing him a brief to spearhead the development of its life sciences practice. Sicsic was previously general counsel at animal healthcare company Virbac Group.

The appointment also marks the latest evidence of a concerted drive by Reed Smith to regain the initiative in the French capital after the office was hit in March by a three-partner raid by shipping firm Thomas Cooper & Stibbard.