Mayer Brown and Reed Smith are continuing their recent expansion trajectories, this time at the expenses of Norton Rose Fulbright (NRF)’s London base and Pinsent Masons’ Middle East operations.
NRF saw the exit of one of its most senior London partners as veteran litigator Sam Eastwood headed for the door after three decades to join Mayer Brown.
Investigations and compliance partner Jason Hungerford has also left NRF for the Chicago-bred shop after seven years.
Eastwood joined legacy Norton Rose in 1989 and most recently acted as the firm’s business ethics and anti-corruption head after launching the group in 2008. Specialising in anti-bribery and regulatory compliance work, he played a key role in securing engineering company IMI as a client for NRF in 2015, becoming one of the company’s relationship partners.
Hungerford, who is dual qualified in the UK and US, joined NRF as a senior associate in 2011 after a spell at White & Case’s Washington DC base. He advises clients on government and internal investigations as well as compliance programmes related to US, UK and EU economic sanctions, export controls, anti-bribery and anti-money laundering laws.
Ian McDonald, co-leader of Mayer Brown’s litigation and dispute resolution practice, told Legal Business that Eastwood was ‘an ideas person’: ‘He is somebody who has built that practice at NRF and I am always attracted by people who have thinking and ideas, not just clients and existing business.’
Of Hungerford he said: ‘In addition to the white collar side he has a particular expertise in sanctions and global trade. In a world where we have Trump throwing sanctions around like confetti and Brexit we anticipate that’s an area that will grow.’
The hires will replenish Mayer Brown’s London litigation practice after partner Tom Duncan quit for Ashurst at the beginning of the month.
Mayer Brown has been in expansion mode this year, hiring Fried Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson London finance head Stuart Brinkworth to its City bench and Allen & Overy’s global co-head of leveraged finance Scott Zemser in New York.
For its part, NRF had a bumpy first half of 2018, losing a number of partners in the US and Asia.
Meanwhile, Pinsents lost its Middle East head Sachin Kerur, who will now lead Reed Smith’s Dubai and Abu Dhabi operations.
Kerur will join Reed Smith together with Pinsents’ construction partner Michelle Nelson, a move which reunites the duo with former Pinsents’ arbitration partner Shourav Lahiri, who left the firm in 2013 to launch his own Singapore shop.
Reed Smith’s chair of energy and natural resources Prajakt Samant said the firm was ‘over the moon to have Sachin, Michelle and Shourav join us’: ‘[They] are regional veterans in the Middle East legal world, each widely acknowledged as outstanding practitioners and strategic thought leaders.’
A spokesperson for Pinsents said: ‘Our 90-strong Middle East business has expanded rapidly over the last two years as evidenced by our joint venture with Alsabhan & Alajaji and the appointment of the market-leading projects team in the region. It remains a key market for us and we will continue to invest in line with our strategic focus on the energy and infrastructure sectors.’
These are the latest in a series of laterals for Reed Smith, which earlier this year hired five partners from NRF in the US and Macfarlanes investment fund finance group leader Bronwen Jones in the City.
