Norton Rose Australia has ended its previous tie-up with Brigitta Rahoyoe & Partners to launch a new formal association with local Indonesian firm Susandarini & Partners.

Norton Rose Australia joins a small handful of Australian law firms with Indonesian alliances – Blake Dawson who restructured its partnership with Soebagjo, Jatim, Djarot to later marry Oentoeng Suria & Partners; Allens Arthurs Robinson and Widyawan & Partners; and Minter Ellison with local commercial firm Makarim & Taira S.

Subject to receiving its application approval, the firm has tentative plans to second three Norton Rose partners to Jakarta – Rick Beckmann from Norton Rose’s Tokyo office; Rebecca Mohr and Ross Ramsay both partners from the firm’s Australian office.

Susandarini, who has worked with Norton Rose for almost five years, began formal discussions of a possible alliance four to six months ago.

“When it came to the point where Norton Rose wanted to help develop a more substantial associate law firm in Indonesia, it was good that we knew her very well with that background,” Norton Rose Australia partner Ross Ramsay said.

Brigitta Rahoyoe & Partners, a firm that predominantly focuses on corporate work, has become a casualty to the broadening ambitions of Norton Rose in Indonesia, who preferred a firm with strengths that fell in step with its own ‘headlight’ practice areas – namely infrastructure, energy, mining, corporate and financial institutions. 

According to Ramsay, work from Indonesia has grown exponentially for the firm, sparking the impetus to “build a bigger platform in Indonesia”.

“The economy in Indonesia is growing rapidly – there’s a lot of clients – whether they are Korean companies, Japanese companies or Chinese, they are focusing a lot of attention on Indonesia, and as a result of that, Norton Rose is picking up a great increase in Indonesian work. This [launch] is only just a part of responding to that; [we are] building something that combines with the regional and global Norton Rose capability by putting additional resources on the ground in Jakarta to handle the work,” Ramsay told ALB. 

At present, Susandarini & Partners has 15 local lawyers that include managing partner Susandarini and three senior associates amongst others.

“The previous association makes it easier in a regulatory sense. Indonesia has quite detailed regulation with structuring these things and purely for historical reasons; it’s been easier for Norton Rose Australia to continue a formal association in Indonesia. But as a matter of practice, this alliance is a close association with the broader Norton Rose Group,” Ramsay said.ALB