Herbert Smith Freehills (HSF) has continued its German expansion with the hire of Baker & McKenzie’s EMEA M&A chair Sönke Becker.
Becker joins HSF’s Düsseldorf office after nine years with Bakers. He joined the firm in 2007 from Hengeler Mueller and was German corporate co-head until 2014. Becker also sat on Bakers’ M&A global steering committee.
His past clients include Hochtief, Telefónica and Deutsche Lufthansa.
Becker is the latest in a string of lateral hires for HSF in Germany. The firm launched in Frankfurt and Berlin in 2013 and expanded into Düsseldorf in February this year through the hire of Thomas Weimann from Clifford Chance. In April HSF picked up a nine-strong arbitration team from boutique Acker Görling & Schmalz.
HSF now has 15 partners and over 70 staff in total in Germany, including five partners and another seven corporate lawyers.
