Osborne Clarke makes up eight Counsels in its German offices

Managing Partner, Carsten Schneider commented: “What’s impressive is that the new Counsels not only show a great quality of character and wide range of talents, but also enable us to further develop Osborne Clarke together in entrepreneurial terms.”

The new career model provides a four-level approach: Associate, Senior Associate, Counsel and Partner. Each level has a standard period required to progress to the next position; however this can be deviated from depending on a person’s previous experience. The Counsel stage can be seen as the final step before partnership, but also as a long-term career stage with entrepreneurial requirements while also still having the opportunity to advance to Partner.

Osborne Clarke recently won the AZUR award for Quality Education and Professional Training, for its effective support and development of their legal staff. The firm has over 130 lawyers in Germany with offices in Berlin, Hamburg, Cologne and Munich.

The Counsels are:

Anne Gebel (Insolvency law, Munich) – who has a distinct understanding of the trade industry – advises creditors on out-of-court enforcement of their claims in Germany and abroad, as well as on liquidation and use of securities. She regularly supports well-known national and international commercial companies in enforcing their pending claims and in avoiding claims being made against them.

Jan Hellenbrand (IP, Cologne) advises companies – particularly in the retail and tech, media and comms sectors – on all matters of intellectual property, with a focus on trademark law, design law and marketing law. His work includes representation in out-of-court and in-court disputes as well as advising clients in building up and structuring their trademark portfolios as well as IP-aspects of M&A transactions.

Tim Maiorino (IT law, Cologne) advises businesses in the digital media and software industry on all matters of digital media and IT law, data protection issues as well as technology-related transactions. Tim has been on secondments to major international digital media clients and spent several months in Osborne Clarke’s Silicon Valley and San Francisco offices. There he developed the firm’s “Germany in a box”, a consulting package for overseas businesses looking to invest in the country.

Katharina Müller, LL.M. (Employment law, Cologne) advises national and international companies on preparing and undertaking restructuring, outsourcing, and HR change measures. A particular focus of Katharina’s is the development of concepts for introducing and using IT in companies. She has particular expertise in retail (e-commerce as well as stationary sales).

Sonja Riedemann, LL.M. (Employment law, Cologne) advises companies on all matters relating to collective and individual employment law, with a particular focus on the IT and real estate sectors. She specialises in drafting and negotiating service contracts for managing directors, board members as well as interim managers. Sonja also advises companies from the UK and US when entering the market in Germany.

Dr Marc Störing (IT law, Cologne) advises international technology groups as well as insurance companies on all matters relating to IT law as well as German and European data protection law. Marc is a specialist in the area of autonomous driving issues and has created an internationally acclaimed software.

Dr Daniel Walter (Banking and capital markets law, Cologne) advises financial service providers and other companies – principally in the retail sector – on banking supervisory regulations, payment transaction law and financing. Daniel also negotiates cooperation agreements and drafts general terms and conditions of business.

Piet Weinreich (IP, Munich) advises companies from the Life Sciences sector throughout the entire product life cycle on matters such as licensing, research and development agreements, industry specific competition law as well as on compliance and regulatory issues. He has in-depth experience in drafting and negotiating contracts as well as representing clients in court and recently returned from a six month secondment in the firm’s Silicon Valley and San Francisco offices.