Fasken overhauls City management team with new senior partner role

Canada leader revamps top-level London team with new managing and senior partners

Fasken Martineau's London office has seen an overhaul of its senior management with the appointment of a new
managing and senior partner.

The Canadian firm appointed UK life sciences chief Gary Howes to take over the post of managing partner from Norman Ziman, who is now the firm's senior partner.

The senior position is a new role for Fasken's London office and comes as part of its succession planning for the future.

Howes joined Fasken as part of UK-based firm Stringer Saul when the two merged in 2007. He has been with the firm for more than 18 years.

Ziman takes up the role of senior partner after 17 years with the firm. He was managing partner of the Stringer Saul team that merged with Fasken.

Meanwhile, corporate partner Jim Lisson has retired from the firm's London office. He was a partner with Fasken for seven years, and previously worked at Canadian rival Ogilvy Renault.

Lisson served as executive chairman of Canadian commercial real estate giant Cadillac Fairview from 1993 to 1994 and was lead adviser to the Canadian Government on the failure of the Canadian Commerce Bank.

The news comes as part of a recent wave of senior management changeovers in the Canadian legal market.

Corporate leader Torys is set to relocate M&A co-chief Phil Brown to the firm's New York office from Toronto.

Brown will join the firm's US arm in July and will head Torys' 16-partner New York offering. Brown is the first Canadian partner that the firm has transferred to the US. The firm has, however, recently scaled back headcount in New York to 40 lawyers, down from more than 60 four years ago. Brown, who also sits on the firm's executive committee, says the downsizing was due to the firm's focus on niche practice areas and the M&A market.

Elsewhere, Osler Hoskin & Harcourt appointed a new firm-wide managing partner earlier this year after Steve Sigurdson stepped down to chair the firm's business law group.

Toronto M&A partner Dale Ponder stepped into the role after co-leading the practice with Sigurdson from 2004 to the end of 2008.

Sigurdson, who also managed the firm's New York outpost from 2000 to 2004, joins former New York managing partner Donald Ross to focus on the national business law group - an overarching national department that oversees the firm's corporate, M&A, financial services and competition practice groups.