Winston & Strawn has confirmed it plans to launch an office in Dubai in the coming months with the hire of Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman finance partners James Simpson and Stephen Jurgenson.
Simpson, who was the co-head of global energy and infrastructure at Pillsbury, will be the co-chair of Winston & Strawn’s global project finance practice in London while Jurgenson, who was the office managing partner of Abu Dhabi at Pillsbury, will be Winston & Strawn’s new Dubai managing partner.
The firm confirmed that the fully integrated team also includes two of counsel and four associates.
Simpson’s practice has a focus on the power, energy, and infrastructure sector. Jurgenson’s practice focuses on the electric power (including renewables and clean energy), water, oil and gas, LNG, mining, and infrastructure sectors in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa.
Both Simpson and Jurgenson left now-defunct Dewey & LeBoeuf in May 2012 for Pillsbury’s Abu Dhabi office, which opened just months before (10 May 2012).
Their departures were first reported earlier this year with eight US-based Pillsbury partners departing for Winston & Strawn (12 March 2015).
The firm’s private equity head James Kelly, investment funds and management practice leader Jay Gould, corporate trust services leader Bart Pisella, executive compensation partner Scott Landau and corporate and securities partners Peter Alfano, Anthony Schouten, Michael Wu and Christopher Zochowski resigned to join Winston in New York and Washington DC.