The Brief:
Norton Rose Fulbright has hired Kate Jefferson from Baker McKenzie as a corporate partner in Sydney.
The move builds on a run of recent NRF partner hires in Australia.
Norton Rose Fulbright has landed Kate Jefferson, appointing the Asia Pacific-focused dealmaker as a partner in its Sydney corporate team.
Jefferson brings more than 20 years’ experience advising on high-profile, cross-border M&A and capital markets deals across Australia and Asia Pacific, spanning private and public M&A, joint ventures, carve-outs, reorganisations and equity capital raisings. Her focus is life sciences and healthcare, technology and consumer markets.
She joins from Baker McKenzie, where she co-headed the Australian healthcare and life sciences group.
Global Managing Partner Peter Scott said the hire strengthens the firm’s cross-border offering.
“Kate’s history of advising clients on complex corporate and M&A transactions across Asia Pacific will strengthen our cross-border corporate offering and our broader Europe, Middle East and Asia Pacific (EMEAPAC) business.”
Jefferson said NRF’s platform and regional ambitions sealed the deal.
“The combination of Norton Rose Fulbright’s strong global platform, well-established Australian corporate practice and ambition to grow in Asia-Pacific was a major drawcard for me.”
The hire lands as NRF Australia’s Head Marshall Bromwich pushes an Aussie growth agenda, looking to build back a local partnership that’s shrunk from around 145 partners in 2019 to 113 today.
The announcement also follows the appointment in Australia of partner Daniel Lin (energy and infrastructure, Sydney and Tokyo) in May, and Brad Robinson (banking and finance, Melbourne) in January 2026.
Source: Norton Rose Fulbright