Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP announced today that Martin Meissner has joined the firm as a partner in its Real Estate Group, enhancing the firm’s substantial and high-quality presence in the country’s real estate and finance markets.
Previously head of Simmons & Simmons LLP’s German Financial Markets Group and its Frankfurt office, Meissner focuses his practice on real estate project development and transactions. He advises clients on the sale and purchase of commercial real estate portfolios and individual properties, as well as construction and planning during the project development process. He also has broad experience with sale and lease back transactions and private public partnerships.
“The German commercial real estate market is one of the most attractive in Europe and continues to see strong activity from both domestic and foreign investors,” said Arno Frings, managing partner of Orrick’s German offices. “Martin is an experienced, sophisticated, entrepreneurial and well-regarded lawyer in the Frankfurt market. He has demonstrated outstanding leadership abilities and will add depth and scale to our German real estate practice.”
Orrick’s real estate practice consists of over 70 lawyers across four offices throughout the United States, as well as Berlin, Dusseldorf, London, Moscow, Milan, Paris, Rome, Hong Kong and Tokyo. Our lawyers represent clients in all phases of real estate investment, financing, development and operations with an emphasis on joint ventures, acquisitions and dispositions of large real estate portfolios, and complex financings and distressed debt transactions. Our clients include the leading international investment funds, real estate advisors, developers, public and private pension funds, REITs, investment banks and institutional lenders.
Meissner and the team he brings along will be based in Frankfurt, the center of sophisticated legal finance and capital markets work in Germany. Harald Heller and Sabine Wieduwilt join as of counsel and Cihangir Agdemir andSarah Rössing as associates.
“Despite the current economic challenges many countries are facing, Germany has been able to maintain its standing as an ideal destination for commercial property investments from international investors,” said Norbert Impelmann, head of Orrick’s German real estate practice. “In addition, German-based funds and real estate investment companies are some of the most active investors in real estate in the U.S., Asia and parts of Europe. Martin’s experience and knowledge of the real estate landscape is second-to-none and will further broaden our reach and ability to serve our clients with their international investments.”
In addition to his legal practice, Meissner is active in academia and public service. He teaches business law at the University of Applied Sciences in Mainz, Germany, and publishes frequently in the fields of real estate and real estate finance law. Meissner offers pro bono counsel to Stiftung Burg Kronberg, a foundation that maintains the ancient Kronberg castle near Frankfurt, and is a member of the supervisory board of the Frankfurt Real Estate Forum, a group of high-level real estate executives who meet regularly to discuss market issues. He earned his J.D. from Julius Maximilian’s University of Würzburg and earned a Ph.D. from Berlin’s Humboldt University.
“I’m extremely excited to join a global law firm with an unparalleled reputation such as Orrick’s,” said Martin. “I look forward to working alongside the firm’s global practice groups and leveraging Orrick’s global platform to further grow my practice.”
