Central and Eastern European firm Kinstellar has joined forces with Croatian law firm Žurić i Partneri (ZiP) to establish a physical presence in Zagreb. 

The deal sees ZiP’s 22 lawyers, including five partners, join Kinstellar’s network in a move the firm said will allow it to offer a wider range of services to new and existing clients in the western Balkans. 

Kinstellar’s new Zagreb base will be led by current ZiP co-managing partners Duško Žurić and Miroslav Plašćar. Žuric has been with the firm for more than two decades and specialises in advising clients on investment and financial transactions in the Croatian energy, infrastructure and real estate sectors. 

Plašćar, meanwhile, originally joined the firm’s litigation group in 1997 before expanding his practice to include handling investment matters on behalf of the firm’s international clients.

Žurić said the deal aligned with ZiP’s goal of creating a practice with a “genuine international profile”, adding that Kinstellar’s international reach has added “new value to a long tradition of pioneering the market and going forward to new horizons”. 

“We are certain that with Kinstellar we will strengthen our position in the Croatian and regional market,” he said. 

Founded in 1995, ZiP has built up a steady client base consisting of major multinationals, investment and private equity funds and financial institutions. It regularly serves large international companies and banks looking to invest in Croatia or large domestic entities looking to build out their footprint across the region, the firm said. 

The tie-up will give Kinstellar its eighth office in Europe after its existing locations in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Serbia, Romania, Ukraine and Bulgaria. The firm also has offices in Asia in Turkey, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.

Kinstellar was founded in Prague in 1992 and later became fully independent when it spun off from parent firm Linklaters in 2008. It added its Ukraine base in June last year when it absorbed DLA Piper’s Kiev office in a move that marked the latter firm’s exit from the Ukrainian market.