Reed Smith Expands into Frankfurt

Reed Smith said it has hired seven new partners to open a Frankfurt office in June and expand its operations in Germany.

Ed Estrada, the firm’s Global Head of Strategy, told Big Law Business that Frankfurt will be the firm’s 26th office worldwide and lawyers there will focus on private equities, real estate, restructuring and financial services.

“We’ve been in Munich for 10 years,” Estrada said, “and the client demand for German capabilities has just continued to increase over the past two years.”

The Frankfurt office will be led by current Munich managing director Stefan Kugler.

Dirk-Peter Flor and Simon Gottlieb Grieser, both previously at Mayer Brown, and Martin Meißner, previously at Orrick, whose practices focus on finance and real estate, are joining Reed Smith to help open the office.

Also joining the Frankfurt office are Andreas Jürgens, who leaves Jones Day, and focuses on corporate acquisitions and divestitures, restructurings and corporate finance, and Volker Kammel who will also leave Jones Day. His practice focuses on restructuring, insolvency, distressed M&A and rescue financing.

Rolf Hünermann and Octávio de Sousa will join from Willkie Farr & Gallagher. Hünermann works on a variety of compliance issues and corporate transactions, while de Sousa represents clients on national and international M&A, private equity and finance transactions.

“The vast majority of our top clients in the finance sector have operations in Germany and our relationships with them continue to expand,” Reed Smith’s global managing partner Alexander Thomas said in a statement. “This new presence in Frankfurt is testament to our continued investment in both the finance sector and our transactional practice globally.”

Estrada said in an interview that the opening of the Frankfurt office “offers additional capabilities in one of the global financial centers that really matches a lot of the business we do in Germany, in Europe and globally.”

“We are building on momentum and we expect continued expansion in Germany,” Estrada added. “We are always looking at opportunities globally to strengthen and grow our existing markets and to explore new markets that might of assistance to our clients.”