Chinese outfit Broad & Bright has opened offices in Hong Kong and Guangzhou.

The 10-year old Beijing-based firm is understood to have had tie up talks with Clifford Chance in the wake of the King & Wood Mallesons merger, but since embarked on its own expansion plans.

It has launched in the special administrative region (SAR) in association with local Hong Kong outfit CFN Lawyers, and in the Southern Chinese city of Guangzhou independently after obtaining a practice licence from the Judicial Bureau of Guangzhou Municipality.

Leading the Hong Kong office is the firm's founder and corporate and litigation expert Jun Ji, alongside commercial partner Philips Ding. They will each split their time between Hong Kong, Beijing and Shanghai.

Ji was previously a lawyer with Kirkland & Ellis in Los Angeles, and later with Japanese firm Mori Hamada & Matsumoto in Tokyo. Ding, who specialises in M&A, private equity, finance and insolvency, is also a trained international lawyer, previously working in the Hong Kong offices of now defunct Dewey & LeBoeuf and also Simmons & Simmons.

Guangzhou is being headed by Shanghai partner Hui Dong, appointed office managing partner, with support from corporate partner Keith Kai Yuan and Japanese-speaking counsel Taotao Zhu.

The two offices have been launched to serve MNC clients in Southern China, bringing the total number of bases to four.