LAWYER OF THE YEAR
Sponsored by:
Winner: Emma Gibson Shoosmiths
Dealmaking normally requires a range of inputs from different professional services and advisory teams – this award highlighted the legal profession and the importance of an individual’s performance during the year.
The five contenders were: Emma Gibson of Shoosmiths, Hugh Jones and Greg Leyshon of Osborne Clarke, Keith Syson of Stevens & Bolton, and Michael Stace of Blake Morgan.
Gibson leads the corporate team at Shoosmiths’ Reading office, and is one of the Thames Valley’s best-known lawyers. Deals included HSBC’s refinancing of Ridgeway; Baird Capital’s acquisition of Clearwater; Pervasive’s sale; Cape’s acquisition of Redhall Engineering ... and many more.
As head of Osborne Clarke’s Financial Services sector, Jones is renowned for his work with bankers, acting for HSBC, Barclays, RBS and Lloyds on a number of key transactions.
Jones’s Osborne Clarke colleague Greg Leyshon is national head of the firm’s corporate and commercial practice. Specialising in private equity deals, Leyshon led OC on numerous transactions in 2015, helping the firm achieve aggregate deal value of over £1.1 billion, and a 25% increase in corporate revenue over the previous year.
Keith Syson is a partner at the Guildford firm Stevens & Bolton, and, in a packed year, advised on the cross-border sale of Biwater BVI; a complex Aspria acquisition and refinancing; Kuoni’s sale of its UK tour operator as part of a global sale; the sale of CD-Adapco; and the Time Inc purchase of UK Cycling Events.
Michael Stace is head of the Blake Morgan corporate team in the Thames Valley. He has a strong reputation in the region as a leading corporate, banking and partnership lawyer with experience of successfully advising both public and private companies on a wide range of corporate transactions.
THE BUSINESS MAGAZINE – THAMES VALLEY – MAY 2016
www.businessmag.co.uk
The ‘Lawyer of the Year’ title winner was described as “someone who has built a reputation as the ‘go-to’ lawyer for deals – and who personally advised on some of the key transactions of 2015.”
Tim Walker, managing director of Taylor Made Computer Solutions, the leading specialist in IT solutions for law firms and other professionals in the south, revealed that person as Emma Gibson.
Having been shortlisted last year, but pipped to the title by Andrew Peddie of Pitmans, Gibson was delighted to regain local legal ‘bragging rights’ for 2016, and the title she previously held in 2012 and 2013.
So, what’s her secret for success? “I love what I do, and the people who run businesses. Having run one myself, I know what it’s like. I love people with entrepreneurial spirit, who put everything at risk and succeed or not. I love people who are willing to try; the ‘do-ers’ not the talkers of this world.”
Gibson is very much a do-er herself, in the active ‘front-line’ of Shoosmiths partner-led service. “I don’t wait for work to find me; I originate and develop workstreams. And, if you use us, I will be more than visible, with a professional input on all the key negotiations and documents. Clients get me, and behind me a really strong team of senior advisers who are absolutely excellent at what they do.”
That team is now 25-strong covering a mixture of banking, corporate and tax work – the largest dedicated Thames Valley corporate finance legal team, she adds.
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