Linklaters has made a notable hire for its Singapore corporate team with the addition of M&A partner William Kirschner from White & Case.

Kirschner, who is based in White & Case's local office, is joining Linklaters' Singapore corporate team of 15 lawyers which is led by partner trio Stuart Bedford, Kevin Wong and Sophie Mathur.

He joined White & Case in 2008 from Goodwin Procter, before moving out to Singapore later that year. He has a strong reputation among private equity houses, corporates and investment banks across Southeast Asia, and works across juridictions such as Indonesia, India, Singapore and Thailand.

Major deals he has worked on have included advising Nestle's $1.7bn (£1.1bn) acquisition of a 60% interest in Chinese company Hsu Fu Chi in 2011, with other big-name clients including AIG, Citigroup, Morgan Stanley, Deutsche Bank and Lehman Brothers.

Linklaters Asia managing partner Stuart Salt said: "We know Will well and have regarded him for some time as one of the leading M&A practitioners in the region. His particular experience in both private equity and Southeast Asia fits really well with our objectives to develop our offering to clients in these key areas."

Linklaters currently has six offices in Asia, including Hong Kong, Beijing, Shanghai, Singapore, Bangkok and Japan.

Last year, the UK magic circle firm took steps to increase its footprint in the south of the region, via a tie-up with Australian firm Allens, which has offices in Vietnam, Mongolia and in Indonesia in association with Widyawan & Partners.

The aim was to focus on corporate work in the energy and resources sector and ramp up Asian revenues. The firm has also in recent months confirmed an interest in opening in South Korea.