Greythorn Group acquires Laurence Simons International

Rapidly expanding international recruitment company, the Greythorn Group, has acquired legal recruitment specialist, Laurence Simons International (LSI), in a deal announced today.

The Greythorn Group is headed by one of the employment industry's most high profile figures, Graham Palfery-Smith, and is backed by private equity house Englefield Capital. The Group's aim is to build a major global recruitment player covering all key world markets through a series of strategic acquisitions and organic growth and LSI is its fourth major acquisition to date. Greythorn IT was the first in September 2006. Banking and finance specialist WH Recruitment, which has offices in Australia, Hong Kong and Singapore, joined the Group in December 2006, followed by UK based finance recruiter, Marks Sattin, in February 2007. Greythorn Group is now operating from 18 offices in 13 cities and 10 countries.

Founded in 1988, LSI is one of the world's largest and longest established legal recruiters and has a network of offices, which covers Europe, the Middle East, the Pacific Rim and Australia. The company works with a complete spectrum of law firms, from small niche practices to the 'Magic Circle' and also has a very strong presence in the in-house market, where it has represented major corporations such as IBM, Dell and Novartis.

LSI is a major force in key legal markets around the world and has an excellent reputation with both candidates and clients, says Graham Palfery-Smith. Its addition to the Group is a significant move towards our goal of creating a truly global specialist recruitment business.

We're very pleased to be joining the Greythorn Group at this exciting stage of its development, says LSI's managing partner, Laurence Simons. Being part of a global player in professional recruitment will help us to expand our business even more rapidly and will open up a whole new set of career opportunities for our people around the world.

Laurence Simons International was advised by Deloitte in the transaction.