Allen & Overy (A&O) has hired Visa Europe’s general counsel (GC), executive vice president and company secretary Vanessa Turner as a partner in its global antitrust practice.
Turner will be based in the Magic Circle firm’s Brussels office, advising European and international clients dealing with EU and other regulators on merger clearance, cartels and other antitrust and competition matters.
Prior to joining Visa Europe, Turner was a special adviser at the Office of International Affairs of the US Federal Trade Commission in Washington, DC and New York and was a member of the cabinet of the EU Commissioner for competition policy.
Dirk Arts, head of A&O’s Brussels antitrust practice, said: ‘We are delighted to welcome Vanessa to our team. She brings a wealth of experience from the European Commission and the financial services sector. Vanessa will boost the capacity of our Brussels team, as part of our global network, to co-ordinate and handle issues relating to multi-jurisdictional transactions and cartel investigations.’
High-profile matters that A&O’s antitrust and competition team have advised on include Sun Microsystems’ $7.4bn merger with Oracle, Seagate Technology on the merger control aspects of its $1.5bn acquisition of the hard disk drive business of Samsung Electronics, and Mubadala Development Company (as the largest investor in the Sony consortium) on its joint acquisition of the EMI music publishing business.