Willkie Farr Hires Former Clifford Chance Germany Real Estate Head, Sees Continued Sector Growth
Cornelia Thaler joins Willkie to head the firm's growing real estate practice in Frankfurt.
January 24, 2020 at 12:14 PM
3 minute read
Frankfurt, Germany / Photo: Shutterstock
Willkie Farr & Gallagher has hired prominent real estate lawyer Cornelia Thaler, who led Clifford Chance's German real estate practice for eight years.
Thaler is a partner in the Frankfurt office, where she will lead Willkie's German real estate practice. She left Clifford Chance in early 2019 after 24 years and has had a solo practice since then. At Clifford Chance, she regularly advised property owners, developers, investors and financial institutions on real estate transactions and related financing.
"We are excited to continue on our growth path with the addition of Cornelia Thaler," said Georg Linde, managing partner of Willkie's Frankfurt office. "With her addition, we will take the real estate practice, including financing, to a new level as we clearly aim for the top of the market. As in all of our practice areas, we strive to advise our clients on their most important and most challenging matters."
Linde told Law.com International that Willkie has an excellent reputation in Germany as a transaction law firm but has so far only been active in the real estate sector in Germany on an occasional basis, although the practice is a leader in the U.S.
Willkie is now expanding its real estate practice, and the volume and number of real estate transactions have been growing, The firm expects this trend to continue unabated, Linde said.
Thaler said in a statement that Willkie is recognized in Germany as a leading transactional firm, most notably for private equity and mergers and acquisitions, and she plans to leverage this platform to play a leading role in the real estate sector.
The firm's team currently has nine lawyers in Germany but is set to expand further over the course of this year, Linde said.
Recently, Willkie advised GoldenTree on the HSH Nordbank transaction and CVC on the acquisition of Bosch Packaging. Willkie has also served as a long-standing adviser to various midcap private equity funds, such as ARDIAN and 3i.
Recent real estate transactions include the combination of German department store chains Kaufhof and Karstadt, as well as the sale of the department stores at Cologne Hohe Strasse and Dusseldorf Carsch-Haus. Further, Patrizia Germany and Domicil Real Estate Group belong to the firm's roster of real estate clients.
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