Fieldfisher has continued its expansion in China with the opening of a third office in the southern city of Guangzhou.

The firm has launched the office with the hire of a seven-lawyer team, including partners Zhongran Lian, Kuan Liu and Connie Wong, from Guangzhou boutique Geenen Law Office. It will focus on corporate, M&A, dispute resolution and intellectual property work.

Lian and Liu focus on commercial arbitration and litigation, including enforcement of foreign court decisions and arbitral awards in China. Wong advises on cross-border transactions and serves as an arbitrator for commercial disputes at the Guangzhou Arbitration Commission.

Fieldfisher's Beijing-based China managing partner Zhaofeng Zhou said the UK firm decided to launch in Guangzhou because it is a major commercial and manufacturing hub and is home to companies from many of the firm's key sectors, such as automotive and biotechnology.

Relatively few international firms have opened in Guangzhou, in part due to its close proximity to Hong Kong. Stephenson Harwood operates in the city in association with Wei Tu Law Firm, a local boutique set up by a group of former lawyers from the British firm.

Fieldfisher's China offices operate as a licensed Chinese law firm under a Swiss verein, a structure similar to that of King & Wood Mallesons. In 2016, it merged with Beijing boutique JS Partners led by Zhou, a former Bird & Bird antitrust partner. It launched in a second office in Shanghai a few months later in February 2017.

The firm now has 14 partners in China, across Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. It listed China as one of the fastest-growing jurisdictions for the firm, with revenue from the country tripling in the 2017-18 financial year.

Fieldfisher recently posted revenues of £207m for the 2017-18 financial year, a 24% increase on last year and a new record high for the firm.

Last week it also announced the launch of a new legal services centre in Belfast, backed by £630,000 of funding from Northern Ireland's economic development agency Invest NI. The base, which will house staff working in legal and risk management as well as technical and business support roles, has launched with 14 staff, but the firm expects to increase headcount to 125 within three years.