The Brief:
HSF Kramer says its merger with Kramer Levin is already converting into new clients and US-linked mandates.
The firm is taking the opposite bet to Aussie independents, backing cross-border reach over local-only ties.
The ink on the HSF Kramer merger is barely dry, and the work is already flowing.
Less than a year after combining with Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel, the firm is winning mandates it simply wouldn’t have seen as a purely Anglo-Australian outfit.
“We've got new clients out of it, because now, if a deal has a US element to it, but a client wants a firm that’s very strong in Australia, we are the firm that offers that combination,” said chair and senior partner Rebecca Maslen-Stannage. “Now we're more appealing.”
The independent Aussie firms wear their lack of global ties as a badge of honour. The logic is straightforward: a US firm hunting for Australian counsel won’t hire a firm that’s already attached to one of its rivals. It’s why Mallesons split from King & Wood, and why Gilbert + Tobin, Corrs and Clayton Utz have long marketed their independence as a feature, not a flaw.
HSF Kramer is betting the opposite. It says, cross-border reach, not independence, is the edge.
“We’re certainly very interested in the US, which is why we did our combination to form HSF Kramer,” Maslen-Stannage said. “And it’s paying off for us.”
Here are some of the US-linked mandates the firm has locked down:
Energy Fuels on its acquisition of Australian Strategic Materials
Kinetic on the sale of a 70% stake to US private equity firm TPG
Sayona Mining on its merger with Piedmont Lithium
And Corporate Managing Partner Matthew FitzGerald expects more of the same. He’s forecasting the usual end-of-financial-year rush, then a stronger second half of 2026.
“We are actually seeing a strong pipeline of work, which we think will manifest itself in the second half of the year,” he said.
Source: Law.com