Senior Restructuring Partners Philip Hertz and Melissa Coakley Join Sidley in London

London – Sidley is pleased to announce that Philip Hertz and Melissa Coakley have joined the firm’s global Restructuring group as partners in London. Both join Sidley from Clifford Chance LLP, where Mr. Hertz was the global co-head of their Restructuring and Insolvency group, and Ms. Coakley led their London Restructuring team.

Mr. Hertz and Ms. Coakley each have more than two decades of experience in advising on complex cross-border restructurings for a wide range of stakeholders including corporates, sponsors, distressed investors, senior lenders, and creditors. Mr. Hertz leads Sidley’s international Restructuring team and Ms. Coakley leads its European Restructuring team.

Mr. Hertz has a broad international practice with significant experience handling restructuring and insolvency matters across the regulated industries involving complex capital structures. He has been ranked as “Hall of Fame” for Corporate restructuring & insolvency by Legal 500 UK and Band 1 for Restructuring/Insolvency by Chambers UK.

Ms. Coakley advises a broad spectrum of stakeholders on consensual and nonconsensual cross-border and domestic restructurings, workouts, reorganizations, and formal insolvencies. She has been highly ranked for Corporate restructuring & insolvency by Legal 500 UK and for Restructuring/Insolvency by Chambers UK.

“Philip and Melissa are widely regarded as leading international restructuring partners with a strong client following who will further elevate our market-leading global restructuring practice,” said Thomas Thesing, managing partner of Sidley’s London office and a member of Sidley’s Management and Executive Committees. “Adding Philip and Melissa is a continuation of the transformative growth to our London platform and highly synergic to our strategic investments in our London Leveraged Finance, Capital Markets and Private Equity practices.”

“We continue to aggressively add collaborative top tier talent to our world-class client focused platform,” said Brian Fahrney, chair of Sidley’s Executive Committee. “Having significant depth and breadth in London is critical to continue to best serve our clients, this is particularly important for the most complex cross-border restructurings as the needs of our clients evolve.”

Sidley has achieved transformational growth in London by adding a significant number of private capital leaders in recent years, including James Inness, Jeremy Trinder, Sean Carney, Ed Gander, David Stewart, Jayanthi Sadanandan, Sam Hamilton, James MacArthur, and Ramy Wahbeh. Likewise during this period, the firm has promoted 15 lawyers to the partnership in the London office and continued its more than decade-long year-on-year revenue growth.

Sidley’s global Restructuring group is regularly involved in the largest restructurings throughout the U.S., Europe, and Asia. The team consists of nearly 70 full-time restructuring lawyers, located principally in our Century City, Chicago, Dallas, Hong Kong, Houston, London, Los Angeles, New York, and Washington, D.C. offices. We represent companies facing in-court or out-of-court restructurings, official and ad hoc committees of creditors, agent lenders, and participants in distressed M&A processes. 

Sidley is an elite global law firm. With approximately 2,300 lawyers and 160 years of experience, we have established a reputation for deploying innovative legal strategies to achieve powerful results for our clients in complex transactional, restructuring, crisis management, investigation, regulatory, and litigation matters.

Our perspective and reach are truly global, supported by 21 offices strategically situated in key commercial, regulatory, and financial centers across the world. Our lawyers and business professionals, fluent in more than 75 languages, possess the cultural awareness and cross-border legal acumen needed to bring clarity to a dynamic business landscape.

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