Four Shanghai local firms - Qinghua, Dongxin, Huali and Guolian - and a team led by partner Lv Yan from Beijing Yumei law firm's Shanghai office have joined forces and formed a new partnership under the brand SG & Co PRC lawyers.

Shanghai: large market, small firms

Shanghai has the nation's second largest legal services market. The city plays host to 1,040 domestic lawyers and over 100 foreign firms. However, the majority of the local firms remind to be small with less than 20 lawyers.

The new firm currently has 6 senior partners, 16 other partners and 70 lawyers, paralegals and support staff. It is managed by executive partner Su Huiyu.
 
The four firms and the team led by Lv Yan have established practices and businesses in the areas of finance, shipping, corporate, tax and real estate. The merger is set to create synergy between different practice groups and develop a competitive advantage in Shanghai increasingly saturated legal services market.

According to Lv, the youngest senior partner of the new firm and a lawyer who has work experience in Fangda and Zhonglun, the new firm has already achieved encouraging results since its establishment in May 2010. In addition to providing improved and more diverse services to their existing clients, the larger size has enabled the firm to bid for mandates and projects of Global Fortune 500 companies and large state-owned and private domestic companies. New clients who have signed up for SG & Co's services including Watts Water, Ping An insurance, the Shanghai branch of Bank of China, State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of Shanghai Pudong New Area, and European investment bank CW Downer. It has also entered into a cooperation agreement with DLA Piper's Shanghai office. ALB