The market is in unanimous accord that Latham & Watkins has amassed market share in the last 12 months. According to clients, who concur that the firm have grown in prominence in the region, it is the quality of the firm's lawyers and their personable approach that has increased its popularity....
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The market is in unanimous accord that Latham & Watkins has amassed market share in the last 12 months. According to clients, who concur that the firm have grown in prominence in the region, it is the quality of the firm's lawyers and their personable approach that has increased its popularity. "These guys have gone in, in numbers, in force and are very proactive on getting business," says one. Singling out Bryant Edwards and Dipti Thakar for praise the client continues: "I think they are very strong across the board. They've got very strong senior associates and council."
Since the inception of its Abu Dhabi and Dubai offices in 2008, the US firm has acquired talent from its American and UK rivals in the UAE. Most recently the firm astutely hired the consistently recommended banking and finance partner Anthony Pallet from Norton Rose, who is described as "one of the leading bank finance lawyers" in the UAE by one lawyer. In February 2010 the firm also poached corporate partner Villiers Terblanche and energy and infrastructure partner Nick Collins from White & Case's UAE practise. The two partners operate out of Abu Dhabi.
Banking and finance is the area in which competitors regard Latham to be strongest. "Latham & Watkins, on the banking side, have become more prevalent," remarks one banking partner. In recognition of the firm's substantial roles and efforts to increase its depth and quality, with Pallet's hire and the relocation of London finance partners Christopher Hall and Craig Nethercott in Aril 2011, it joins banking and finance in tier three.
New arrival Hall has not taken long to settle in and is representing of a Middle East sovereign wealth fund on a $5 billion syndicated loan secured through a global portfolio of publicly traded equity securities.
A cross border project finance deal in Jordan sees banking and finance practice head Treblanche advising on Advising The Aqaba Development Corporation on the new $500 million port of Aqaba.
A further project sees the firm advising an Abu Dhabi corporation on the development of the new aluminium rolling mill.
In the highly publicised Dubai world restructuring, client favourite Edwards continued to act as one of the representatives to the Government of Dubai and the Dubai Financial Support Fund in restructuring the $60 billion liabilities of Dubai World and it subsidiaries.
Competitors query what deals Lathams' has acted on in the capital markets area ostensibly because the firm has been serving clients outside the UAE.
On the equity side Andrew Tarbuck and Thakar advised Wataniya Mobile, a Palestinian mobile phone operator, on its $50 million IPO on the Palestine Exchange in Nablus. The deal, which closed in November 2010, was shortlisted for IFLR magazine's Middle East Equity Deal of the Year.
A groundbreaking mandate completed by Edwards on the debt side, which was the first conventional high-yield bond deal in the Middle East and shortlisted for IFLR magazine's Middle East Debt & Equity Deal of the Year, saw him represent MBPS Finance Company in its $320 million 11.25% senior notes issue due 2015.
Latham's M&A team joins tier 4 after receiving plaudits from peers: "They've got some very good people over here," remarks one. Others note the firm is becoming more present on the market: "L&W, we're definitely seeing them more they're definitely on the up. They're doing local deals too," says one M&A lawyer.
The firm's market-recommended practise head Charles Fuller advised Emaar Properties on the sale of the Hamptons International, a real estate agency in the UK, Europe and Asia to Countrywide.
Elsewhere, Fuller acted for a US purchaser in its acquisition of a majority stake in a Kuwaiti target company that manufactures calcined coke.
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