Hughes Hubbard & Reed has hired counsel Paul Marston to serve as the firm's Tokyo office head, making up for the departure of arbitration counsel Tony Andriotis, who was the firm's sole lawyer in the Japanese capital.

Marston came from Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman, where he also was counsel. He focuses on corporate and finance matters, particularly on project development and mergers and acquisitions, in the energy, construction, pharmaceuticals and technology industries. Last year, he was part of the Pillsbury team that advised Japanese conglomerate SoftBank Group Corp. on a $77.7 million investment in Canadian lithium miner Nemaska Lithium Inc.

Marston leaves Pillsbury after six years with the firm. Previously, he served as general counsel at Tokyo-based Mitsui Oil Exploration Co. Ltd. and its Houston-based subsidiary MOEX USA Corp. from 2011 to 2013, where he managed the company's U.S. litigation relating to the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. In 2012, MOEX Offshore, which had a 10% stake in BP Plc, settled with the U.S. Department of Justice, paying at least $90 million.

He also did stints as counsel at legacy Bingham McCutchen and as an associate at Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, both in Tokyo, and practised at legacy Chadbourne & Parke in Los Angeles.

"Our roots in the region are in Japan, where we have decades of experience representing large companies and financial institutions," Ted Mayer, the New York-based chair of Hughes Hubbard, said in a statement. "Paul's addition is a testament to our ongoing commitment to the region."

The New York-based firm opened its Tokyo office in 2003 – its first and only outpost in Asia. Until March, Hughes Hubbard's sole lawyer in the Japanese capital was arbitration counsel Tony Andriotis, who left to join Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan as a partner.

Meanwhile, Marston's departure leaves Pillsbury with six partners in Tokyo, focusing on energy and project finance, corporate and intellectual property matters.

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