Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom is launching an investment management practice in London with the hire of Macfarlanes funds partner Stephen Sims.

The launch, which will happen in the coming months after Sims has worked out a notice period, will give the New York firm its first investment management practice outside the US.

Skadden is launching the practice in response to increased use of private capital in Europe, with the firm hoping to target European private equity, hedge funds, family offices and sovereign wealth funds from its City base.

The practice will add to Skadden's existing full-service London offering which already includes M&A; private equity; international arbitration and litigation; white-collar crime and corporate investigations; high-yield and capital markets; banking; corporate restructuring; and tax.

Sims, who joined Macfarlanes in 2002 and became a partner in 2006, advises fund managers and investors on the structuring, establishment and operation of investment funds. He specialises in structuring private equity and real estate funds and secondary sales of private equity portfolios. During his time with Macfarlanes he has worked with clients including Goldman Sachs, Alchemy Partners, Montagu Private Equity and Amadeus Capital.

Sims' hire takes the total number of partners in Skadden's London office to 30, with his appointment following the recruitment of SNR Denton's advocacy head and former deputy chairman Rory McAlpine as of counsel.

Prior to McAlpine's hire, which was announced in April, Skadden's most recent London hire was that of arbitration partner David Kavanagh, who joined the firm from O'Melveny & Myers in 2009.