A&O Shearman has launched an office in Chicago after hiring a pair of energy and infrastructure partners from Mayer Brown. 

Paul Astolfi was co-head of Mayer Brown’s global projects and infrastructure group and has made the move alongside partner Katy McNeil. 

Adam Hakki, A&O Shearman’s US chair and co-chair of its global executive committee, said the hires were a “major step forward” for the firm’s energy and alternative energy practice and overall US growth plans. 

“We’re thrilled to be bolstering our capability in the Texas and Chicago markets as well,” he added. 

Astolfi is based in Dallas and also spends significant time in Chicago, where McNeil is based. A&O Shearman said it would be launching a presence in the city “subject to requisite approvals”. The office will be the firm’s 10th in the US. 

Astolfi has spent the past 15 years as a partner at Mayer Brown. He advises institutional investors, banks and other debt providers in energy transition matters, notably renewables, and specialises in finance, M&A, reorganisations with greenfield and brownfield projects, multi-tiered financing structures and cross-border transactions.  

Meantime, McNeil made partner at Mayer Brown in 2023 having joined the firm after qualifying in 2015. She focuses on domestic renewable energy in addition to solar asset-backed securities and structured finance in the solar commercial and industrial space.

Kent Rowey, global co-head of A&O Shearman’s energy, natural resources and infrastructure (ENRI) practice, said energy transition was a central component of the firm’s global and US ENRI strategy and that Astolfi and McNeil would be expected to lead its efforts “in this critically important sector”.

A&O Shearman said that, including Astolfi and McNeil, it had hired 14 partners into core practice areas since the merger that created it went live last May, five of them in the US. Other US hires include high-yield partner Alyssa Simon, who joined in New York last May from Morgan Stanley, and Andrew Tannenbaum, who joined late last year to co-lead the cybersecurity practice having been general counsel at Barclays Execution Services. 

Despite the hires, A&O Shearman’s partnership has shrunk since its creation, with the firm set to have cut 10% of its roughly 800-strong partnership by the end of its current financial year on 30 April. The firm said last September the cuts, which included the closure of its Johannesburg office, would reduce overlapping capabilities and enable it to focus on recruiting partners in growth areas. 

Last October A&O Shearman’s New York office saw a quartet of senior finance partners defect to Linklaters, including a global co-head of its financial markets practice, David Lucking.