A&O Shearman has lured the head of Travers Smith’s incentives and remuneration group, Mahesh Varia, in London.

Varia is set to join A&O Shearman’s incentives practice as a partner after nearly 27 years at Travers, where he advised Numis Corporation on its takeover by Deutsche Bank and Micro Focus on the incentives aspects of its £5.1bn takeover by OpenText, among other matters.

David Broadley, A&O Shearman’s global co-head of M&A, commented: “We are delighted to welcome Mahesh to A&O Shearman. His expertise and knowledge will greatly strengthen our offering. And our transformational merger provides a great platform to grow our activities in this area.” 

Varia’s hire comes as A&O Shearman undergoes a complex post-merger integration process that has already seen the transatlantic firm resolve to cut 10% of its 800-strong partnership by the end of the financial year. The firm is also moving to an all-equity partnership and adopting a three-level modified lockstep system for partner compensation. 

Meantime Varia’s departure from Travers follows other exits from the firm recently, including former head of tax Simon Skinner’s defection to Latham & Watkins in September. Earlier in the year respected corporate M&A and ECM partner Richard Spedding also left for Linklaters and private equity duo Ian Keefe and George Weavil joined Goodwin Procter. 

A Travers spokesperson commented: “We would like to thank Mahesh for his contribution to the firm and wish him all the best in his new role.”

Travers has also bolstered its ranks in recent months, adding infrastructure debt partner Ryan Ayrton from Watson Farley & Williams in July, just a few weeks after it hired Joel Grossmark as a partner from Blackstone Credit and Insurance to boost its retailisation practice.