Mayer Brown JSM has appointed Hogan Lovells' partner Gabriela Kennedy to lead its intellectual property and TMT practice across Asia.

Kennedy, who has 19 years of experience in her practice, joins the US firm today and brings the total number of IP and TMT partners at Mayer Brown's Hong Kong office to four.

She was previously based with Hogan Lovells in the city, where she trained and then worked as a partner for more than a decade.

Handling all aspects of IP work including enforcement, licensing, registration and litigation, she has advised on several high profile cases in the region, including litigation on behalf of Microsoft in relation to the sale of mod-chips that enable the bypassing of copyright protection measures in Xbox consoles.

She has also been involved in a number of IT, data protection and digital piracy cases and in lobbying for changes to the Copyright Ordinance in Hong Kong.

Commenting on her appointment, John Mancini, co-leader of Mayer Brown's global IP practice said: "Gabriela is widely known throughout the industry for handling ground-breaking litigation-particularly concerning copyright and digital piracy matters.

"She will be a tremendous asset in servicing global clients in high-stakes IP matters."

Kennedy's appointment is the second lateral partner hire by Mayer Brown in Asia this year, with others made at non-partner level.

Last month, the firm appointed corporate partner Betty Tam in Shanghai from Herbert Smith Freehills, in addition to capital markets lawyer Guoqing Li in Beijing from Chinese law firm Jingtian & Gongcheng.

In January it also recruited project finance lawyer Ben Thompson from Allen & Overy to work as a consultant in its Singapore office.

But the firm has also lost two prominent partners in Asia in the last 12 months.

These include Hong Kong funds partner Yong Ren, who was hired by Proskauer Rose in September, and Singapore finance partner Ben Sandstad, who was head of structured finance for Asia and who moved to DLA Piper in July.