LAW FIRM Thursfields has recruited four new senior associate solicitors to its commercial services team as the company expands.

The legal practice was this year’s winner of Birmingham Law Society’s Law firm of the year award for five to 15 partners and has recently opened premises in Birmingham and Solihull, adding to its core presence across Worcestershire, where it has offices in Worcester and Kidderminster.

John McLean joins from Eversheds in Birmingham. A commercial property lawyer, Mr McLean has dealt with a wide range of sites, from the usual offices, banks and warehouses, to the more varied such as sewers, energy storage facilities and biomass plants. He has particular expertise in the telecoms and energy sectors.

Jane Rudge joins Thursfields’ commercial team from Higgs & Sons. She is an experienced commercial solicitor with expertise in commercial contracts, technology, intellectual property, joint-ventures and terms of trading. Tim Edwards joins the corporate team from The Wilkes Partnership to work alongside Thursfields’ director, Gareth Burge, whose leadership has seen the profile and ranking of the corporate team develop rapidly. Mr Edwards' practice areas include mergers and acquisitions, corporate finance and restructuring.

Jenny Smith is a charity law specialist who joins Thursfields from Birmingham Firm, Anthony Collins and has acted for various types of charity during her legal career including churches of various denominations at local and national level. She has also acted for other “not for profit” organisations including Community Interest Companies and trading companies established by charities to support their work.

Michelle Chamberlain, Thursfields head of commercial services, said: “The commercial services team achieved significant growth over the past two financial years and we recognised the need to scale up in line with our commercial clients’ demands. We now have more than 25 lawyers in our commercial services team, all of whom are experts in their particular legal disciplines. These new appointments enable us to offer additional expertise in niche areas, such as charity law and IP as well as provide the extra resource needed for our growing corporate and commercial property teams."