Russia's KIAP, DS Law, and Balashova Legal Consultants have announced that the three firms will be merging and operating as KIAP Digital & Smart.
According to a joint press release, "the completion of the integration process will take at least six months and is expected to end by summer 2020. The new Russian legal firm will employ over 80 professionals, including 15 partners."
Andrey Korelskiy, Managing Partner at KIAP, Attorneys at Law, will be in charge of the new consolidated legal firm.
KIAP, which was founded as a full-service firm in 2010, has 40 lawyers and counsels.
DS Law, which provides legal support to businesses in the high-tech segment, specializes in corporate and tax law, venture transaction support, Private Equity and M&A transactions, intellectual property, and dispute resolution. The firm has six partners and 25 associates, with offices in both Moscow and St. Petersburg.
Balashova Legal Consultants specializes in Russian and international labor and migration law, as well as serving the German-Austrian business community. According to BLC, its clients are "international and Russian companies operating in the field of trade, services, manufacturing, automobile and machine building, construction, consulting, in the banking and investment sectors.
“In April 2020, KIAP, Attorneys at Law, will celebrate its 10th anniversary," explained KIAP's Andrey Korelskiy. "Over these years, we have gone a long way to become a traditional legal firm as we are today: we have built relationships of trust with our clients, developed our brand and built a reliable and close-knit team. Now, it is time to move on, and we are proud that our first anniversary will also see us taking such a big step forward. I believe that by joining our resources and efforts, we will become even stronger as a professional team of attorneys and lawyers and set а new trend of consolidation and cooperation for the local legal market,”
“We see this consolidation as an important milestone for our team and we are absolutely sure that this step will shape the Russian legal services market," added DS Law Managing Partner Oleg Ponamarev. "Together, we will be able to aim at even bigger and more complex projects in different economy sectors and compete with the largest national and international legal firms in our legal services market. We will put all efforts into bringing the best practices and expertise from each of the parties of this consolidation process to our new team."
“Employees are the key to success in any business," noted BLC Managing Partner Elena Balashova. "We are happy to become a part of one of the largest players in the Russian legal services market and to bring our unique competences and experience in labour and migration law to the table and provide comprehensive support to international companies entering the Russian market."
