Paul Hastings has hired a corporate partner from Clifford Chance in Frankfurt.
Bernd Meyer-Witting focusses on M&A and private equity, specialising in energy, media and technology work. He will become the US firm’s seventh German partner when he begins work on January 1.
Meyer-Witting was the latest of around a dozen partners that have departed Clifford Chance’s German branches since late 2014 when it began restructuring its partnership in the country. So far, the most senior exits this year have been the 'magic circle' firm’s heads of banking and private equity head Oliver Felsenstein and Alexandra Hagelüken, who both joined Latham & Watkins.
This latest partner hire by Paul Hastings was its third in Europe in November. Earlier this month its London branch recruited two City heavyweights: Linklaters finance specialist David Ereira and Berwin Leighton Paisner's head of structured finance and capital markets, Paul Severs. The firm has said it intends to expand its London team to 50 partners by 2020.
Clifford Chance is not the only international downsizing in Germany. Freshfields is in the process of closing its Cologne branch and White & Case recently announced it was shutting its Munich office.