Head of asset
finance: Andrew Maskill
No. of partners
(assistants): 6 (14)
Key lessor
clients: Abbey, BAL Global Finance, BNP Paribas
Lease Group, Carlyle Finance, Close Leasing, The Cooperative Bank,
Deutsche Leasing, Hitachi Capital, HSBC Equipment Finance, ING
Lease, Lombard, Lloyds TSB and Bank of Scotland, National Australia
Group, SG Equipment Finance
Key lease broker
clients: Asset Finance & Management, Total
Asset
Key manufacturer
clients: JCB
New clients gained in
2009: Macquarie Bank, Mitie Group
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It’s all go at Addleshaw’s asset finance
department, and not just because its litigation department, run by
Sally Butt, is making money on the back of the sharp rise in fraud
(she acted, for instance, in the sizeable Global EPP case).
The utilities sector has become a major earner
for the department, and this is reflected in its winning of the
Mitie Group, the UK engineering and power company, as a new
client.
Andrew Maskill, the department’s longstanding
head, reckons income this calendar year (the firm’s financial year
is end of April) will match last year’s growth of 20 percent.
Although litigation continues to bring in slightly more revenue
than transactional work (60-40 ratio), the latter, which is run by
Maskill himself, continues to grow.
This is in part due to rises in international
work – which now represents a whopping 30 percent of its overall
work – particularly in software and yellow goods financing. The UK
government rule changes of two years ago, which allowed effectively
“double-dip” deals to be done out of the UK to overseas clients,
has helped this to happen.
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By GlobalDataAnother driver, according to Maskill, has been
UK lessors’ desire to invest more in customers they know best,
including in their non-UK arms. The department also acts for
lessees, and this work continues to come in through the front
door.
On the litigation front, the sole reported
case of the past year has been ING Lease (UK) Limited vs Harwood,
which was to do with enforcement of personal guarantees, while on
the insolvency front it acted on the administration of Newtown
Rentals, Industrial Corporate Finance and Access Rentals. Meanwhile
the recession has not stopped it from advising on one significant
securitisation, details of which were kept confidential, and the
sale of a multi-million pound lease portfolio.
But with solid financing transactions still
coming in, including in recent months the £10 million financing of
a lorry fleet and a £5 million financing of forklift trucks, plus
the usual influx of Sharia law-related work, Maskill’s team remains
a force to be reckoned with. Also, with no staffing changes, it
remains a solid and reliable department.
