The office – set for a January opening – will be headed by Ted Shapiro, the Motion Picture Association's current head of legal for Europe in Brussels.

Pan-European advice

Simon Baggs, Wiggin's head of content protection commented: ‘The world of copyright is borderless and rapidly changing. Our clients need pan-European advice and the obvious synergies with Ted's experience will put us at the heart of EU regulation.
‘The climate for content creation and protection across Europe has become particularly challenging but there are real opportunities for media companies. An increasing level of European legislation is directly impacting the media sector.’

Baltic expansion

Meanwhile, Swedish firm Magnusson has launched an office in Latvia’s capital, Riga, according to a report from Top Legal.
The move is part of the firm’s expansion plan of targeting the Baltic States. The new office -- branded Magnusson Riga -- became operational last week and is led by mergers and acquisitions specialist and managing partner Gints Vilgerts. He heads a team of eight lawyers including four partners, which will advise clients on corporate, M&A, competition, banking and finance, dispute resolution, tax and regulatory matters.
The firm also launched offices in Malmö and Tallinn in January and April 2012 respectively, as well as an expansion to Oslo in August 2012. Magnusson now has 11 offices in the Baltic Sea region with a presence in Copenhagen, Gothenburg, Helsinki, Minsk, Moscow, Stockholm and Warsaw adding to the recent launches.