India's third largest law firm by headcount, AZB & Partners, has acquired Bangalore boutique Anup Shah in a move designed to increase its presence in South India. Despite predictions that liberalising the legal market would see India’s relatively smaller firms compete with stronger–resourced foreign firms, AZB partner Abhijit Joshi said the merger would have occurred regardless.
“Frankly this is not a move which is influenced by any changes in the industry, this is to demonstrate how we view Bangalore as an important base and we’ll continue to augment and grow there. This is pretty much a quality driven move and not influenced by what’s happening, or by the market conditions,” said Joshi.
The acquisition will raise the firm’s headcount by 18 lawyers and add two new offices for AZB—in Hyderabad and Chennai. Real estate lawyer Anup Shah will come on board as AZB’s nineteenth equity partner and become managing partner of its Bangalore office.
“We already have a sizeable presence in Bangalore and with this merger we think that we’ll be one of the largest Pan-India law firms,” said Joshi. “We have already acquired two firms…so this acquisition is not something we are new to, its part of our overall strategy and something we would have done otherwise.” AZB & Partners was formed through the merger between Ajay Bahl & Co and CZB & Partners to establish the firm in 2000.
The merger follows a number of similar moves over the past few months. In May this year another of India's largest firms, J Sagar Associates, acquired Bangalore boutique firm M&C Partners while ALMT Legal announced a tie up with UK firm Clyde & Co. These are in addition the referral agreements that many of India's top firms have with large international firms including AZB with Clifford Chance.
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