Bruce Wasserstein, the most famous lawyer-turned-banker, has died at the age of 61.

The former Cravath Swaine & Moore corporate lawyer died yesterday (14 October) after being taken to hospital with an irregular heartbeat at the weekend.

Wasserstein left Cravath in the 1970s after spending five years as an associate with the firm to join First Boston, and went on to enjoy a highly successful career in investment banking. At the time of his death he was chairman and chief executive of Lazard.

Over the course of a 32-year career Wasserstein advised on more than $250bn (£153bn) worth of deals and most recently advised Kraft Foods on its $16bn (£10.2bn) bid for Cadbury.

Wasserstein was regarded among a select group of New York bankers and lawyers who shook up the staid world of corporate takeovers in the 1970s and 1980s alongside figures like Watchell Lipton Rosen & Katz's Marty Lipton and Joesph Flom of Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom.

He is credited for developing a raft of techniques in the M&A sphere, including the 'Pac-Man defence' where a targeted company turns around to purchase its buyer.

Often a controversial figure, he earned the nick-name "Bid 'Em Up Bruce" for its aggressive bid tactics. This reputation was cemented by his appearance in the celebrated books Barbarians at the Gate and The Last Tycoons; the former the story of the controversial leveraged buyout of RJR Nabisco and the latter an award-wining account of the history of Lazard.

His career also reflected the success of US corporate lawyers in investment banking – a marked contrast to the UK where only a handful of lawyers, such as Slaughter and May's Michael Pescod, have moved into finance.

Wasserstein purchased Legal Week sister titles The American Lawyer for $63m (£39.8m) and National Law Publishing for $200m (£123m) in 1997 before selling them to Incisive Media for $630m (£387.9m).

Other notable deals included advising on DuPont's $9bn (£5.5bn) purchase of Conoco, Campeau's $6.6bn (£4.06bn) takeover of Bloomingdale's owner Federated Department Stores and Morgan Stanley's merger with Dean Witter.