Allen & Overy (A&O) has boosted its New York private equity team with the hire of Nick Marchica from Baker McKenzie, where he chaired the New York transactional practice group.

Marchica is rejoining A&O, having previously served a four-and-a-half year spell as a New York qualified senior foreign lawyer in its Sydney office and at its associated law firm in Indonesia. The former White & Case and Cadwalader associate switched to Bakers on his return to New York in 2016. 

“The expansion of our US PE capability is a natural tie-in to the strength of our US leveraged finance practice and our international deal capabilities, which are foundational pillars of our growth strategy,” said Bill Schwitter, chair of A&O’s US private equity practice.

Marchica’s experience covers advising PE funds, family offices and corporates across the US, Asia Pacific and Europe on private M&A, joint ventures and other transactions. 

In October, he was on the Bakers team that advised digital media venture equity firm North Equity on its acquisition of media assets from Bonnier Corporation, which included the digital and print businesses for the brands Popular Science, Field & Stream, Outdoor Life, Saveur, Popular Photography, Better You and Interesting Things.

Career highlights include advising One Equity Partners on the $655m sale of Sonneborn Refined Products to HollyFrontier in November 2018.

A&O has flagged US expansion as a strategic priority, making five lateral hires and three internal promotions in its last financial year. These included the hire of two federal enforcement partners in Washington DC from Orrick.

It secured two notable additions to its New York private equity team in 2018 when Stephen Besen joined from Shearman & Sterling and partner Paul Burns rejoined the firm after a spell as a general counsel, including at Novartis.

A&O climbed three places to sixth in Mergermarket’s Q1-Q3 2020 global buy out ranking by value, advising on 21 deals valued at $32.6bn. That made it the highest-ranking non-US firm in table. However, it dropped eight places to 17th in terms of deal count.

In July, Magic Circle rival Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer opened a seven-partner Silicon Valley office – its third US base – after hiring five partners from four US rivals.