Cleary Gottlieb Adds Leading M&A Partner in Cologne

International law firm Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP announced today that leading German M&A lawyer Jürgen J. Sieger will join the firm as a partner in its Cologne office.

Mr. Sieger, 53, comes to Cleary Gottlieb from Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, where his current practice includes the whole range of corporate advisory and M&A work. His expertise extends to a broad range of industry sectors. Mr. Sieger has been recognized by JUVE, the leading German guide to lawyers, as one of the top ten senior M&A lawyers in Germany and is the author of numerous publications on corporate law.

Mr. Sieger’s appointment brings the total number of Cleary Gottlieb partners to 184.

“Jürgen’s arrival at Cleary Gottlieb will provide an opportunity to build on our recent success in German M&A,” said Cleary Gottlieb Managing Partner Mark Walker. “His presence in Cologne, where we already have a highly regarded competition and antitrust practice, will complement the excellent corporate and M&A capabilities in our Frankfurt office and strengthen our ability to handle complex German and cross-border corporate transactions.”

Mr. Sieger, a native of Bonn, was admitted to the Bar of Cologne in 1983. He joined Deringer Tessin as an associate in 1983, becoming an equity partner in 1988. In January 2000, Deringer Tessin merged with Freshfields. Since 2000, Mr. Sieger has been a member of Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer’s German corporate committee and has headed the firm’s corporate practice in Cologne.

Commenting on his move, Mr. Sieger said, “I have spent many rewarding years at Freshfields and played a role in the integration and growth of the practice following the merger with Bruckhaus. But joining a distinguished firm like Cleary Gottlieb presents a new challenge for me and gives me the opportunity to make a contribution to developing the firm’s M&A practice in Cologne and across Germany.”

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For further information, you can contact Christof von Dryander at +49 69 97 10 31 30 (Frankfurt) or Dirk Schroeder at +49 221 80 04 01 50 (Cologne) or Amy Fantini, Media Relations Manager, at + 1 212 225 3775 (New York).

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About Cleary Gottlieb’s Global M&A Practice

Cleary Gottlieb is a recognized leader in mergers and acquisitions throughout the world, excelling in M&A transactions in the United States, Europe, Latin America and Asia, which make use of the firm’s ability to handle cross-border transactions seamlessly.

Cleary Gottlieb’s M&A practice ranked highly in the Mergermarket, Bloomberg, Thomson Reuters and Dealogic league tables for 2005. The firm was first for global financial industry transactions based on deal value (Bloomberg) and was fifth in worldwide M&A based on deal value (Thomson Reuters).

Cleary Gottlieb also ranked third on Dealogic’s ranking of firms as counsel to either principals or financial advisers and fifth in total European deal value when deals involving counsel to the principal only were considered separately.