Norton Rose has strengthened its Middle East banking practice with the hire of partner Karl Rogers in Dubai.

Rogers joined the firm on Monday (10 March) to head up a regional structured products practice – work Norton Rose has previously been covering from the UK. He will initially lead a team of three banking associates based in Dubai and Bahrain.

Rogers joins from Sentinel Advisors and was previously group general counsel at Shaheen Business & Investment Group and head of trading and derivatives, legal, at Dresdner Kleinwort. He specialises in derivatives and structured finance and will focus on advising investment banks, sovereign wealth funds and financial institutions in the Middle East and North Africa.

Norton Rose Middle East managing partner Campbell Steedman said the move to launch the practice in the region was prompted by client demand.

He told Legal Week: "This is a growth area, which a lot of clients have said is lacking in the region. There is also a view from clients here that it will be less acceptable in the future to do this work from the UK."

Rogers added: "The wealth in this region is enticing to investment banks which are very much on the ground here, expanding their presence. I am very excited about merging my commercial experience [in the field] with Norton Rose's practice."

The hire takes the number of partners in Norton Rose's Dubai office to seven. The firm also has an office in Bahrain and at the start of this year secured an alliance with 15-lawyer Saudi Arabian firm Abdulaziz Al-Assaf.

The firm recently strengthened its Islamic finance practice in the Middle East, bagging Denton Wilde Sapte capital markets partner Farmida Bi at the end of last year.