Ashurst has expanded its German M&A offering after recruiting the joint head of Beiten Burkhardt’s corporate practice.
Thomas Sacher, who moves with counsel Volker Germann and an associate, has joined the UK firm’s Munich branch. He specialises in transactional work - M&A, private equity and alternative investments, especially in the automotive, entertainment and publishing sectors – and his recent clients have included adidas, Bosch, SAP and SGL Carbon. Germann is a more general corporate advisor.
The UK firm’s new hires expand its German corporate practice to 25 fee-earners - six partners, five counsel and 14 associates. Sacher explained that the firm’s ambitions for its German practice and its international platform were the two decisive factors behind his move.
Sacher’s hire is a welcome addition for Ashurst’s Munich corporate team, which had to accept the resignation of two partners in 2013. First, the firm’s then German corporate head Lutz Englisch moved to Gibson Dunn’s rival outpost in the city, then, towards the end of the year, private equity specialist Nikolaus von Jacobs defected to McDermott Will & Emery’s Bavaria base.
January has seen several other senior corporate hires in Germany. DLA Piper appointed managing director and partner at MCF Corporate, Christoph Stoecker, as an of counsel in Hamburg, and Heuking Kühn Lüer Wojtek announced Ali Sahin will join it as partner from Paul Hastings in Frankfurt next month.