- Europe
- Big Law Weekly
Week covered: 28 September – 4 October 2026 · Back to the week page
Stephenson Harwood and Taylor Wessing spent the week in early-stage talks over a combination, while US firms kept pulling partners out of London and the Continent. The two are discussing a single-profit-pool merger of about £500m across Europe, the Middle East and Asia, with a partnership vote targeted for the end of 2026 and completion on 1 May 2027, The Global Legal Post reported.
Across the City, WilmerHale rebuilt its disputes practice with two senior hires, a Weil corporate partner prepared to join Paul Weiss, and A&O Shearman added partners in secondaries and patents.
Stephenson Harwood and Taylor Wessing weigh a £500m merger across Europe, the Middle East and Asia
The talks come months after Taylor Wessing's own restructuring. Its UK, Dutch, Irish and Belgian arms broke away in June 2026 to form Winston Taylor, a £1.2bn, 1,400-lawyer transatlantic firm, with Winston & Strawn, RollOnFriday reported. What remained is an independent European Taylor Wessing of about 700 lawyers across 16 offices.
The financials are modest. Stephenson Harwood's revenue fell 2% to £303m in 2025/26 and profit dropped 12% to £105m, while Taylor Wessing's German offices booked €243m for 2025, Legal Business reported. Stephenson Harwood had earlier framed organic and bolt-on European growth, including a return to Madrid, as an alternative to a full US merger.
The firm is also losing people as it talks. A&O Shearman's two new global secondaries co-heads, Gabriel Boghossian and Sarah de Ste Croix, came from Stephenson Harwood, The Global Legal Post reported.
WilmerHale, Paul Weiss and Sullivan & Cromwell take London partners from Clifford Chance, Cooley and Weil
WilmerHale hired Clifford Chance's UK commercial disputes head Jeremy Kosky as its disputes practice head, alongside Cooley's arbitration chair Charlie Lightfoot, months after a disputes team left WilmerHale for King & Spalding, Legal Business reported.
Weil faced further London losses. A UK corporate partner is set to join Paul Weiss, following an impending four-partner finance departure. London co-managing partner and M&A head David Avery-Gee and a cluster of finance partners are moving to Sullivan & Cromwell, part of more than 30 exits worldwide since January 2026, LawFuel reported.
Other London hires ran the same way. Haynes Boone added Louise Woods as a partner and Chair of International Disputes, Pulse 2.0 reported. Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer added a team head from Sidley, its second London lateral of the week into life sciences, and hired life sciences regulatory partner Marie Manley, Legal Desire reported.
The pattern has a longer record. US firms took 80% of 129 private equity partner moves in London since 2020, with 21 in the first half of 2025, Law.com reported, and Edwards Gibson counted 668 announced London partner moves in 2025, about 21% above the prior record, Nonbillable reported. Mayer Brown and Latham & Watkins both added London partners this year to build private equity and leveraged finance platforms.
Jones Day, Weil and DLA Piper hire in Milan, Frankfurt and Vienna
Continental hiring ran in parallel.
In Germany, Weil added David Jansen as a private equity partner in Frankfurt, extending a German build-out across financial regulation and secondaries, Legal Business reported, and CMS hired financial markets specialist Tobias Bauerfeind in Frankfurt from Ashurst, LTO reported. In Vienna, DLA Piper appointed Carmen Redmann as a finance partner from Taylor Wessing, effective 1 October, Extrajournal reported. A&O Shearman took DLA Piper's leading European patent partner Constanze Krenz, JUVE Patent reported.
France and Spain saw partner moves and new boutiques. King & Spalding hired disputes partner Julie Chapuy in Paris with her team, Le Monde du Droit reported; Darrois Villey Maillot Brochier added partners Philippe Guibert and Alexandre Eberhardt, Décideurs Juridiques reported; and Franklin added restructuring partner Arnaud Moussatoff, Le Monde du Droit reported. In Spain, Andersen Iberia integrated Martín & Parés to add litigation partners Eva López Parés and Víctor J. Martín in Barcelona, Lawyerpress reported, while Uría Menéndez alumni Rafael Sebastián and María Noguera launched the M&A and restructuring boutique Noguera Sebastián in Madrid, Lawyerpress reported.
Covington elects 15 partners including Marc Norman in Dubai, KWR promotes five in Vienna
Covington elected 15 new partners across five offices, including Marc Norman in Dubai, Pulse 2.0 reported. In Austria, KWR Karasek Wietrzyk promoted five counsel to partner in Vienna, including energy team head Sarina Illo Ortner, Extrajournal reported. Read more.
Wim Dejonghe launches flat-fee firm Falcon as CMS cuts UK business services
The week also brought a new model and a cost cut. Wim Dejonghe, former global senior partner of Allen & Overy, co-founded Falcon, a Belgium-based, AI-native firm built on flat fees that plans to charge €1,000 to review six high-friction contracts, with work checked by a lawyer; he argues technology will accelerate "the death of the billable hour", Legal Business and Legal IT Insider reported. CMS began cutting its UK business services teams as it moves toward greater use of technology, with no headcount given, Legal Business reported.
Rankings and financials showed the established order. Clifford Chance, Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer and Linklaters took the most top-tier London rankings in the latest Legal 500 UK research, Legal Business reported, and Germany's 100 largest commercial firms passed €11bn in revenue, with Freshfields the leader and Gleiss Lutz and Latham recording double-digit growth, LTO reported.
The European market is moving two ways at once. Mid-sized firms are discussing consolidation under flat or falling profits, while US and global firms add partners in London, Frankfurt, Milan, Vienna and Paris, concentrated in private equity, disputes, finance and life sciences.
The full list of the week's moves is on the Europe week page.
