Listed firm DWF is to open a base in Southampton, having poached 13 lawyers from insurance specialist Keoghs.

The new team – which includes partners Rachel Coombs, Sarah Parker and Stuart Giddings – will specialise in catastrophic and serious injury work. DWF now has offices in 32 locations worldwide, including in 11 UK cities.

The announcement follows a series of new partner hires to the firm’s insurance division since the beginning of the financial year.

Glyn Jones, CEO of insurance services at DWF, said: ‘I am delighted that Rachel, Sarah and Stuart are joining DWF. They are outstanding catastrophic injury lawyers and have rapidly grown their business unit in Southampton over a short period of time, thanks to the excellence of their client offering and expertise.

‘We have numerous clients in Southampton and the surrounding areas, and with the new team also joining us I am confident that this will be a great success.’

Earlier this month, DWF said it was seeing ‘strong’ signs of recovery after annual results showed a sharp fall in underlying adjusted profit before tax, attributed to the impact of the pandemic. In the quarter ending 31 July the firm said it made a £600,000 loss, against £1.9m in pre-tax profit in the same period last year.

DWF Group shares now stand at 72p after falling to 46.3p in early July. They had been as high as 142p in March.

In June, DWF announced that it would be closing its offices in Brussels and Singapore and scaling back its presence in Dubai and Cologne, in a drive for 'more profitable growth'.