January 11, 2010 — Three leading lawyers specializing in energy transactions and mergers and acquisitions have joined the international law firm Vinson & Elkins as partners, providing their experience and leadership from their previous practices with Sullivan & Cromwell, Latham & Watkins, and Baker & Botts, respectively.

The three new partners — Ahmed T. el-Gaili, James R. Hanna, and Jay T. Kolb — bolster V&E's position as the world's leading energy law firm (Euromoney, 2010 - 2011), and they strengthen the firm's capabilities to represent public and private corporations and private equity firms in major M&A, and project development and finance transactions. They also enhance V&E's capabilities in Texas, China, and the Middle East, which are strategic economic centers for many V&E clients.

The news of these three new partners joining V&E follows last week’s announcement that the firm had promoted eight associates and Counsel to partnership and that a ninth associate had been promoted to Counsel in the firm’s Beijing office. In addition, 64 attorneys joined V&E as associates in November and January. The firm currently has 771 lawyers in its 14 offices internationally.

"We are pleased that these three talented partners have chosen to join Vinson & Elkins," says V&E Managing Partner Joe Dilg. "Ahmed, James, and Jay are among the best in their respective practice areas. The addition of these three partners advances V&E's strategic goals in the energy industry, to expand one of the premier private equity practices, and to enhance our capabilities worldwide in our active mergers and acquisitions practice and our growing practices in China and Saudi Arabia.”

• Ahmed el-Gaili, joining Vinson & Elkins from Sullivan & Cromwell, will be located in V&E’s offices in the United Arab Emirates. Ahmed has extensive experience in mergers and acquisitions, and project development and financing, with a focus on projects in energy and the Middle East. He has advised clients on a number of landmark energy project financing transactions in the Middle East and Caspian region, including the Dolphin gas project between Qatar and the UAE, Yemen LNG in Yemen, and Tengizchevroil in Kazakhstan. A graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School, where he served as Managing Editor of the Harvard International Law Journal, Ahmed also worked in the Global Energy Group at Morgan Stanley in New York where he provided investment banking advice on mergers and acquisitions for energy companies. A native speaker of Arabic, he lived in Saudi Arabia for more than 16 years.
  
• James Hanna, previously a partner in Latham & Watkins’ Washington, DC, office, represents private equity firms and public and private corporations involved in mergers and acquisitions of companies in the energy, healthcare, government contracting, and telecommunications industries. James, a graduate of the Boalt Hall Law School at the University of California at Berkeley, has represented major private equity firms such as Riverstone in major transactions involving oil field service companies, other energy concerns, and healthcare companies. He has clerked for Delaware Supreme Court Chief Justice Norman Veasey, and will be based in V&E's Dallas and Washington, DC, offices.
  
• Jay Kolb is widely recognized as a preeminent international M&A and project development and finance lawyer with deep knowledge of the energy industry and significant experience with the development of liquefied natural gas and crude oil and natural gas pipeline projects. Jay was a lawyer at Baker Botts for 25 years, where he opened and served as the partner in charge of three of the firm’s international offices in Moscow, London, and Baku. He advised one of the world’s largest energy companies in the formation of a $2 billion joint venture to own and operate an LNG terminal and pipeline system in Texas, as well as other LNG projects in North America, Europe, and the Middle East. Jay also was the lead corporate legal advisor to a consortium of energy companies that constructed and operates the $4 billion Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan crude oil pipeline system. He will be based in V&E’s Shanghai office where he will assist the firm’s other energy partners in China in representing clients in both in-bound and out-bound investments.