clipart.com 2012
Pinsent Masons is opening a new office in Paris after recruiting a nine-partner team from Marccus Partners, the legal arm of accounting firm Mazars.
The new nine-partner office in the French capital, which will open for business September 1, will mark Pinsents' second continental European base and comes just two months after the firm set up shop in Munich on July 1.
The new office will initially be staffed by a team from the Paris office of Marccus Partners, and will offer a full range of legal services including corporate, M&A, commercial, restructuring, finance, real estate, IT/IP, employment, litigation and arbitration.
The team includes corporate and M&A partner Christoph Maurer, who will take the role of office head, alongside public and private M&A partner Christophe Clerc as general manager.
The other partners are Pierre Forget (restructuring and litigation), Emmanuel Gouge (IP/IT), Anne-Laure Fonade (real estate), Pierre Francois (finance), Jean-Francois Rage (employment), Antje Luke (corporate/M&A) and Nathalie Sinavong (litigation and arbitration).
Pinsents senior partner Chris Mullen said: "Opening in France has always been a key step in our international growth. Not only is it Germany's major trading partner, France is also a conduit for investment in north and sub-Sahara Africa from the EU, China and the Gulf.
"Central to our global sector approach, the new office puts us in a strong position to capture more in and outbound work across Europe and provides a key link with our clients in the Gulf and Asia."
The news comes in the same week as the firm confirmed it is making 47 members of its support team redundant in the wake of its merger with McGrigors in May.
DLA Piper also announced it is strengthening its presence in Paris via a merger with local boutique firm Frieh Bouhenic, which is due to be completed on October 1.
