King & Spalding has hired a trio of international arbitration partners from Kirkland & Ellis to grow its Latin American and European practice.

Javier Rubinstein will take up residence at the firm’s Chicago office while  Lauren Friedman and Lucila Hemmingsen are joining King & Spalding’s New York arm.

Rubinstein and Hemmingsen are both from Argentina and all three lawyers count South America as key markets and are able to conduct arbitrations in Spanish as well as English.

Andy Bayman, head of King & Spalding’s trial and global disputes practice group, said: "The three work very closely together with multi-national companies and investors to address the uncertainty that commercial, regulatory, and investment-treaty disputes can pose to their reputational and fiscal well-being.”

Zach Fardon, managing partner of King & Spalding’s Chicago office, added that Rubinstein “instantly enhances the depth and breadth of our client offerings in the Chicago office by extending the firm’s strong international arbitration practice into Chicago and the greater Midwest”.

Rubinstein handles international commercial and investment arbitrations. Before joining Kirkland in October 2016, he was vice chairman and global general counsel of the PricewaterhouseCoopers network of firms. 

Friedman focuses on investor-state and commercial arbitrations across a variety of sectors including oil and gas, mining, consumer goods, pharmaceutical, infrastructure, banking and public utilities. 

Hemmingsen, who is dual-qualified in civil and common law, advises and represents domestic and foreign companies in commercial arbitrations, as well as foreign governments and investors in investment-treaty arbitrations.

Rubinstein said: “King & Spalding’s Chicago office under Zach Fardon has made a big impression on the market and we wanted to be a part of growing the office.”

Recent developments in arbitration globally have seen two Paris-based Jones Day specialists leave the firm to set up their own boutique and the former managing partner of Clifford Chance’s (CC's) Singapore ally doing the same in the city state.