Bates Wells

Bates Wells joins the ranking, having hired highly experienced development finance partner Joe Whitfield from Michelmores LLP in 2023. Whitfield’s experience with DFIs, coupled with the firm’s charity and social enterprise client base, positions the firm perfectly to handle impact investment work that involves several practice areas. The team, which includes M&A specialist Nirav Patel and charity law expert Oliver Hunt, works on the establishment of impact investment vehicles investing in frontier markets, notably Sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia and Latin America.