Effective immediately, Jones Day is opening a new office in Düsseldorf, Germany.

 

Jones Day continues to expand and invest in its successful German practice. The opening of a new office in Düsseldorf, the industrial heartland and center of corporate activity in Germany, closely follows the promotion of seven new German partners from Jones Day’s internal ranks just a month ago. Jones Day has been in Germany for 21 years. In 1991, the Firm opened an office in Frankfurt, the center of German banking activity, followed by the 2003 opening of the office in Munich, the home of the German and European patent offices and patent courts. Both offices have grown steadily and now combined have more than 70 lawyers. The opening of a third German office in Düsseldorf is a recognition of the critical role Germany will play in the global economy and its status as one of the most important and sophisticated legal markets in the world.

 

The new Düsseldorf Office will initially focus on corporate matters, M&A, private equity, antitrust, and patent litigation as well as growing Jones Day’s client base in the region. As the home to the most important patent infringement court in Europe, Düsseldorf is a natural choice for Jones Day’s strong global patent practice. Antitrust will play an important role, since the close vicinity to the German cartel office and Brussels has made the Düsseldorf region one of the main centers for antitrust work in Europe. Düsseldorf has one of the largest Japanese communities in Europe and is the European and German headquarters to many Japanese corporations. The combination of Jones Day’s offices in Tokyo, Brussels, and Düsseldorf will offer Japanese clients all of the services required in connection with their investments into Europe.

 

“Germany’s unprecedented position of importance and leadership in the global economy is a product of the achievement of German industry and its business leaders. Germany is poised for an even brighter future as German investment reaches all corners of the world. Jones Day was built by its partners to provide clients the capacity for sound risk assessment of those new markets and opportunities and to defend zealously the interests of those clients and the decisions they make. We have been fortunate to have so many wonderful German clients and we look forward to continuing to provide dedicated service to them in the future,” says Steve Brogan, Jones Day’s Managing Partner.

 

“As a firm whose century-old roots are in the industrial heartland of the United States, we understand the opportunities and challenges German industrials face in this global economy. The new Düsseldorf Office will allow us to better serve our German clients who require access to globally integrated legal services in order to take full advantage of those opportunities,” says Mary Ellen Powers, Jones Day’s Partner-in-Charge for Europe and the Middle East.

 

Partner-in-Charge of the new Düsseldorf Office will be Ansgar Rempp, the current Partner-in-Charge of the Munich Office and Jones Day’s top deal maker in Germany. Mr. Rempp has been with Jones Day for almost 20 years. In 2003, he opened the Munich Office, which has grown to become one of Jones Day’s most successful offices. Very recently, the Munich Office has been recognized by JUVE as “Law Firm of the Year 2011 in Southern Germany”. Mr. Rempp has been named as a leading partner in both M&A and private equity in JUVE’s Handbook 2011/2012, one of only eight lawyers in Germany to be so recognized. In each of 2010 and 2011, Mr. Rempp was the lead partner on landmark transactions in Germany, including the auction sale of the Wittur Group for Goldman Sachs, Cerberus, and CSFB and the acquisition of VAC Group for OMG.

 

Mr. Rempp has also been appointed as the coordinator of Jones Day’s German corporate and transactional practices overall. He will initially be joined by Tom Mahlich, a litigation partner from the Munich Office and Johannes Zöttl, an antitrust partner from the Frankfurt Office. For more than 10 years, Mr. Mahlich has been leading Jones Day’s German litigation and arbitration practice. Mr. Zöttl is an experienced antitrust lawyer who will lead the antitrust practice in Düsseldorf.

 

“Our German practice has recently made very significant progress, in particular in M&A, private equity, antitrust, and patent litigation. The Düsseldorf Office will accelerate this development and is a major step forward for Jones Day towards becoming one of the leading firms in Germany. We are in discussions with a number of very promising lateral candidates in Düsseldorf, some of whom will likely be joining us shortly,” said Ansgar Rempp.

 

“The opening of a third office in Germany, in addition to the recent appointment of seven new partners in Germany, shows the strength of Jones Day’s commitment to the German marketplace. Düsseldorf is an ideal city for us to expand to, as it serves as German headquarters for many corporations and financial institutions,” says Jürgen Reemers, Partner-in-Charge of the Frankfurt Office.

 

New Partner-in-Charge of the Munich Office will be Sandra Kamper. Ms. Kamper joined Jones Day in 1995 and has been a critical force in the successful growth of the Munich Office. She is a distinguished corporate finance, capital markets, and real estate transactional lawyer. Recently, she has been the lead partner on several highly complex financing transactions, including for OM Group and Riverside. Ms. Kamper will be Jones Day’s 12th female Partner-in-Charge out of a total of 38 offices and the Firm’s third female Partner-in-Charge in Europe.

 

“The addition of an office in Düsseldorf, home to one of the most active and well renowned patent infringement courts in Europe, will further expand our highly successful IP and patent litigation practice, by adding a second patent litigation venue to our Munich presence. We are excited about the opening of a Düsseldorf Office and the opportunities this will present to us and our clients,” says Sandra Kamper.