Hamilton Locke continues to attract top talent as we focus on strategic growth, with five new partners joining our team nationally:
- Andrea Kennedy (Corporate, Melbourne): Andrea is a respected adviser to Australian and international clients on all aspects of private M&A across a broad range of sectors, particularly the TMT, digital infrastructure, retail, education, health and financial services sectors. She is also one of Australia’s leading telecommunications lawyers and has advised major Australian carriers, tower companies, government departments and smaller telco providers on a range of regulatory, commercial and transactional matters. Andrea is also experienced in media regulation, government and regulated industry work, competition and consumer law issues, and privacy. She has worked in top-tier law firms and in-house legal positions, including in the US.
- James Nicholls (Corporate, Perth): James has built a reputation for successfully finding solutions to complex problems facing the domestic and international companies he advises. He specialises in complex, cross-border and contested public M&A transactions, IPOs, secondary equity fundraising, and advice to boards on corporate governance matters. He co-founded the UWA Law School’s M&A course and the “Corporate Control Forum” thought leadership event on M&A related business and legal matters convened in partnership with the UWA Business and Law Schools.
- James Patto (IP &Technology, Melbourne): James joins us having led the Melbourne Digital, Cyber & Technology Law team at a Big 4 firm for several years, where he helped establish the firm’s multi-disciplinary cyber incident and AI offerings. With a background in large-scale technology transactions, advising on complex technology regulations and responding to cyber and data incidents, James delivers strategic, business-driven legal and commercial solutions across privacy, data protection, AI, and cyber security. James will also hold a dual Partner role in Helios Salinger, HPX Group’s dedicated privacy, data and AI governance business.
- Mark Payne (Tax, Sydney): Mark has substantial experience in providing strategic and solution-based tax advice to domestic and multinational companies and private groups across a range of industries. Mark was previously a partner at a large national firm and spent three years as a director at Goldman Sachs JBWere.
- Sophie Uhlhorn (Litigation and Dispute Resolution, Melbourne): A highly experienced disputes lawyer, Sophie specialises in complex competition disputes and investigations, commissions and inquiries and commercial disputes. She has acted for individuals and corporations in some of Australia’s most high-profile criminal and civil competition prosecutions and led investigations into complex fraud concerns for both private and governmental bodies.
Commenting on the appointments, Nick Humphrey, CEO of HPX Group and Managing Partner of Hamilton Locke, said: “Our ambition for our firm and for HPX Group more broadly has always been to attract people who want clear air and opportunities for deep collaboration, to deliver our clients leading cross-functional expertise across legal, risk and compliance. We’re pleased to have Andrea, James, Mark, James and Sophie join our team, with their experience reflecting strategic growth areas for us and where we continue to experience strong demand.”
These new partners come during a period of increased growth for HPX Group, following the launch of our new sustainability consulting vertical business, Materra, and Helios Salinger in 2024. We recently welcomed Linda Romanovska to Materra as a Partner and Head of Sustainability Consulting.
