Hammonds has boosted its business recovery and insolvency teams with the promotion of two new partners.

The half-year promotions will see Paul Muscutt and Daniel French made up to the national firm's partnership next month (1 November) in London and Birmingham respectively.

Muscutt specialises in non-contentious and contentious insolvency work, with a focus on the banking and asset-based lending sectors. He recently completed a nine-month secondment at Barclays Bank.

French covers non-contentious insolvency and restructuring matters and has worked on administrations including those of clothing retailer Adams Childrenswear and the Observer Standard Newspapers.

Half-yearly promotions are not standard practice at Hammonds, but have taken place at the firm over the past three years to accommodate business needs and to reward high-performing senior associates.

The promotions are in addition to eight lawyers made up to the UK top 25 firm's partnership earlier this year during its principal May promotion round.

Hammonds managing partner Peter Crossley said: "Paul and Daniel are both exceptionally talented lawyers and will play a key role in Hammonds' future development."

Meanwhile Hammonds is set to lose partner Tom Bridgford from its commercial and dispute resolution practice after he handed in his notice on 30 September – one of only two days each year on which equity partners are able to resign from the firm.

The next destination of the Manchester-based franchise, branding and IP specialist is as yet unknown.

Hammonds overhauled its partnership agreement in 2006 in the wake of a string of partner walkouts, bringing in measures that left equity partners with only two windows each year in which to resign – 30 September and 31 March.

The last set of departures on 31 March 2010 saw Manchester head Jonathan Edwards and construction chief David Moss resign from the firm to join DWF and McGrigors respectively.