Partners at Mills & Reeve and Manchester firm George Davies have voted in favour of a merger that will create a £77m law firm.

The merger, which will go live on 1 June, will trade under the Mills & Reeve brand, with 16 partners and 89 other staff housed at 1 New York Street where both firms lease offices.

Nationally, Mills & Reeve will have 112 partners and 870 staff operating from six offices in Birmingham, Cambridge, Leeds, London, Manchester and Norwich.

Legal Week previously revealed that the merger was to be put to the respective partnerships at the end of this month.

Mills & Reeve managing partner Guy Hinchley (pictured) said: "This merger will enable us to grow our presence in the north substantially and to progress our strategy of providing a full range of legal services to clients in our key sectors."

George Davies managing partner Mark Hovell added: "As a well-established, profitable, Manchester firm we have had regular approaches from firms looking to establish or strengthen their presence in the Manchester marketplace.

"We chose to merge with Mills & Reeve as we have a lot of synergy with them and their culture closely reflects ours. This merger will enable us to offer our clients access to a wider range of legal services and specialist sector advice from the Mills & Reeve national practice and international networks and also to pursue new clients who have previously been beyond our reach."

The news comes a week ahead of the merger between Bond Pearce and Dickinson Dees, which will officially go live on 1 May. The combined Bond Dickinson will have revenues of around £100m, ranking it inside the UK top 40.