When Linklaters – well, Thierry Vassogne – landed a role on the € 55bn (£37.5bn) Sanofi-Aventis merger back in January, how the City giant secured the instruction seemed just a footnote.
But the fact that Sanofi’s preferred counsel, Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton, first turned the job down because of a conflict is increasingly looking like an omen for the French corporate market. Not only was Linklaters the sole UK player to take a substantive role on the ground-breaking merger, the deal is arguably the last headline French instruction for a magic circle firm for eight months… and counting.
