People
Accountancy and business advisory firm BDO has promoted 14 new partners across its tax, audit and advisory teams. The promotions, which are effective as of 30 June 2018, take BDO’s intake of new partners to 66 in the last two years.
BDO promoted seven people in its audit practice: Joe Aswani, Arbinder Chatwal, Matt Crane, Charles Ellis, Andrew Radford, Louise Sayers and Chris Young.
In the tax team, Cory Blackmore, Andrew Crossman, Richard Dalton, Brad Payne and Steve Talbot have been promoted.
Within the advisory team, Iain Nettleton, who specialises in complex international projects, and Duncan Berry, who
K&L Gates has appointed Jae W Park as a partner in the firm’s private equity practice, effective from 1 June 2018.
Park is based in the firm’s New York office.
He advises and counsels public companies and financial sponsors on a wide variety of US and cross border transactions, including leveraged buyouts, mergers, equity purchases, asset acquisitions, strategic investments, joint ventures, and dispositions.
GCM Grosvenor, a global alternative asset management firm with more than USD50 billion of assets under management, has appointed Matthew Rinklin as Managing Director.
Rinklin joins GCM Grosvenor from Oaktree Capital Management and will be responsible for executing the firm’s Labour Impact Infrastructure investing strategy. Labour Impact Infrastructure investing is investment in infrastructure that relies on a collaboration with union labour to unlock infrastructure opportunities and generate high quality risk-adjusted returns, while creating an enduring positive impact on organised labour.
“Matt is widely respected in the infrastructure investing space and shares our firm’s vision for impact infrastructure investing in partnership
Regulatory compliance firm Optima Partners has appointed former Bain Capital chief compliance office Alan K Halfenger as a Partner at the firm.
In his role at Optima, Halfenger (pictured) will focus on the regulatory and compliance needs of private equity managers, hedge funds, broker-dealers and global financial services firms.
Optima CEO Jonathan Saxton says: “Our reputation as a trusted adviser and go-to resource for CCOs and CFOs is essential to our approach and growth. Alan’s deep knowledge and broad regulatory expertise will be significant contributors to our mission and to our clients. He joins a team of highly talented regulatory
Global law firm Dentons has hired partner Gianpaolo Garofalo to establish the firm’s Italian Desk in London, and lead the Structured Finance group within the Banking and Finance practice in Italy.
Garofalo (pictured), joins from Italian law firm BonelliErede, where he worked for the past two years in the London office. Prior to that, he worked at Allen & Overy in Rome. He has more than 15 years’ experience in banking and finance, with a particular focus on structured finance. He assists national and international clients in securitisation, factoring and repackaging transactions. He has solid experience in derivatives, liability management
Ogier has strengthened its funds practices in the Cayman Islands and Luxembourg with three partner promotions.
Funds specialists Justin Savage and Anne-Gaëlle Delabye have both been promoted to partner in the Cayman Islands and Luxembourg respectively, while fund finance lawyer Mark Santangeli has been promoted to partner in the Cayman Islands.
Savage, who joined Ogier in 2013, advises some of the firm’s largest investment fund clients on the full life-cycle of open-ended and closed-ended investment funds and private equity structures.
He has also played a leading role in the firm’s cross-jurisdiction innovation strategy which last week saw Ogier
Investec Specialist Bank (Investec) has appointed Galina Markova to its Corporate & Acquisition Finance team, which is responsible for the origination and structuring of leveraged finance and private debt solutions for mid-market corporates and private equity clients across Europe.
Based in the team’s London office, Markova will play a key role in driving growth from both the client base as well as from new strategic initiatives, which includes tapping into the strong institutional demand for private debt assets.
Markova joins from SMBC where she was an Executive Director in their European Leveraged Finance team. Prior to this, she was
Kreston Reeves has strengthened its Corporate Finance practice through a merger with Surrey-based corporate finance boutique SamCorp, and the appointment of Jack Clipsham as Corporate Finance Partner.
SamCorp directors Peter Samuels and Darren Hurdle will move into the Gatwick office of Kreston Reeves and trade as Kreston Reeves. Established in 1998 as Samuels Corporate, SamCorp is a specialist corporate finance and strategic consultancy offering tailored advice to shareholders, directors and managers across a broad range of sectors. It has been behind some of the highest profile company sales and acquisitions in the South East over the past two decades. Samuels
Sarah Zeng has joined Orrick’s M&A and private equity practice, resident in Beijing. Zeng has over 25 years of corporate law experience serving Chinese state-owned enterprises (SOEs) and US multinational companies, and most recently served as Managing Partner of Denton’s Beijing office.
Prior to that, Zeng was General Counsel of Hong Kong-listed Weichai Power, China’s largest engine manufacturer, and Vice President and Country Manager (China) for El Paso Corporation, a Fortune 500 energy company, where she chaired the boards of four major power plants owned by the company in China.
Zeng is the 18th partner to join Orrick’s Global
Cédric Lalain has joined Artemid as a Partner. Since 2017, Lalain worked as Head of Fixed Income at Assurances Crédit Mutuel and now joins the team which advises funds from the Artemid range.
These funds provide senior financing solutions, with maturities between five and seven years to European SME and mid-cap companies, both listed and unlisted.
“In view of the growth of our business and the success of our last fundraising, we are delighted to welcome Cédric Lalain, who will bring the expertise he has accumulated within the Caisse des Dépôts Group and the Crédit Mutuel Group,” says Annie-Laure
Events
12 November, 2026 – 8:00 am
12 November, 2026 – 5:00 pm