alex taylor

Alex Taylor

Alex is The Lawyer’s international editor. He joined in 2017 as a reporter covering litigation and the Bar, leaving in 2019 and returning in 2021.

lisbon,portugal

Abreu edges close to €50m mark after 19 per cent growth

Portugal’s Abreu Advogados fell short of hitting the €50m revenue mark for the first time in its history after revenue surged by almost a fifth in last year. The firm’s top-line grew to €49.7m (£42.8m) from the previous year’s €41.7m. Managing partner Inês Sequeira Mendes praised the firm’s growth, but poured cold water on any […]

Amsterdam, Holland

The Passport: De Brauw ushers in third generation of PE lawyers

Welcome to The Passport, your regular round-up of the most important stories to come from the European legal market. In this edition we take a look at the third generation of De Brauw’s private equity group and how domestic and regional firms in Ukraine may look to reshape after the war. De Brauw has entered […]

New York alone isn’t worth it anymore

European firms see more value in having a physical office in the Square Mile than they do in the Big Apple. Last week, Spanish firm Uría Menéndez became the latest to shut up shop in New York, having been there for 30 years. Uría was the final member of Slaughter and May’s fabled Best Friends […]

Milan Italy

Orrick replenishes Milan office with hires from Shearman’s Italian arm

Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe has drafted in the former M&A head of Shearman & Sterling’s Italian associate firm to rebuild its transactional capacity in the country. Fabio Fauceglia joins the firm from Studio Legale Associato Shearman & Sterling, bringing with him a team of six lawyers, comprising of counsel Leonardo Pinta and five associates. Fauceglia […]

Central Park, New York

Uría Menéndez to close New York office in strategic shift

Iberian firm Uría Menéndez will close in New York when its Park Avenue lease expires, after more than three decades in the US. The firm runs with a small staff in New York of just three lawyers, led by office managing partner and corporate lawyer José Félix Zaldivar. Uría Menéndez felt its US strategy would […]

madrid

No-one expects the Spanish acquisition

We’re all watching eagerly for the changes coming at Allen & Overy on 1 May as its merger with Shearman & Sterling finally goes live. But Addleshaws has its own significant change that day. Next Wednesday, Andrew Johnston will officially kick off his tenure as managing partner with longstanding incumbent John Joyce stepping aside. Addleshaws […]

Trondheim, Norway

Euro 100 firm left reeling after rival’s six-partner raid

Norway’s Sands has suffered one of the largest mass defections in its history after six partners left to join Big Five firm Wiersholm in Trondheim. The hires bolster Wiersholm in a range of the firm’s key sectors, including marine law, renewables, technology, real estate and tax. The firm has committed to further growth over the […]

stockholm

The Passport: Technological change is driving mergers across the Continent

Welcome to The Passport, your regular round-up of all the most important stories to come from the European legal market. In this edition, CMS Wistrand recently went live and its drivers were myriad, but one in particular stood out for us; Poland is dangerously underlawyered in one very particular area; and Pinsents has embarked on […]

Copenhagen, Denmark

Some firms have all the luck

For one firm, the pan-Nordic dream is dead. For another, it’s just begun. Hannes Snellman’s announcement that its Stockholm and Helsinki offices will be going their separate ways later this year represented the end of a strategic gamble that started 16 years ago. Back then, its leadership bet that opening in Stockholm (2008) and Copenhagen […]

Fieldfisher re-enters Italy with five-partner hire

Fieldfisher has launched an office in Milan with a five-partner hire just six months after cutting ties with its partner firm in the country. The firm gained regulatory approval to launch the new office on 4 April, which begins as a 26-lawyer, five-partner operation in northern Italy. All five partners – including country managing partner […]