Debevoise to offer local law advice in Hong Kong
Debevoise & Plimpton is to offer local law advice in Hong Kong from next month, after two decades of operating as an international legal practice.
September 29, 2014 at 11:24 PM
2 minute read
Debevoise & Plimpton is to offer local law advice in Hong Kong from next month, after two decades of operating as an international legal practice.
The US firm, which opened in the city in 1994 and has since provided only New York and English law counsel, will begin practising Hong Kong law as of October 1, following in the footsteps of US rivals Kirkland & Ellis, Simpson Thacher & Bartlett and Davis Polk & Wardwell.
The news follows the hire of two locally qualified counsel in the last year, disputes lawyer Andy Soh who previously worked in-house at General Electric, and former King & Wood Mallesons corporate partner Stuart Valentine, who is also Hong Kong qualified.
To comply with local rules, managing partner and fund formation lawyer Andrew Ostrognai has recently taken the Hong Kong bar exam, along with the firm's other Hong Kong resident M&A partner Drew Dutton – boosting the number of Hong Kong qualified lawyers.
Ostrognai said there was no compelling reason for the firm to switch to Hong Kong law now, except it made sense.
"By nature we are quite a conservative firm. We have been watching the market, but now we feel it is the right time. There was no specific event; it has been on our radar screen for some time.
"We don't anticipate changing our practice – it just means we can offer a wider range of services. In some transactions Hong Kong law comes up. Now we don't have to use to a local firm."
Debevoise now has 19 lawyers based in the Hong Kong office, 12 of which are admitted as Hong Kong solicitors.
Its core practices are private equity, funds, insurance M&A and disputes, and in February this year the firm's head of European and Asian litigation, former UK attorney general Lord Peter Goldsmith QC, was appointed vice chair of Hong Kong's arbitration body – the Hong Kong International Arbitration Centre (HKIAC).
Outside of Hong Kong it has seven other offices, one of which is a small representative base in Shanghai.
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