Instructions Of The Week 24.01.2002

Our round-up of new instructions is headed by the five-strong panel set up by the Office of Telecommunications (OFTEL), which follows a major tender exercise involving more than 50 firms: City practices DLA, Theodore Goddard, Fox Williams, and Denton Wilde Sapte won out, together with Shropshire firm Etheringtons.Birmingham City Council has selected six firms in the region to handle its public law and property law work after a review of best value: Browne Jacobson, Eversheds, Hammond Suddards Edge, Martineau Johnson, Mills & Reeve, and PinsentCurtis Biddle.Liverpool Vision, the first urban regeneration company to be formed in the UK - it is a partnership between Liverpool City Council, the North West Development Agency and English Partnerships - has named Masons, Eversheds, DLA and Hammond Suddards Edge on its legal panel.The Manchester office of Pinsent Curtis Biddle, which opened this month, has won its first major instruction: it is acting for PricewaterhouseCoopers, administrators of Famous Army Stores, which has 195 retail outlets.

City firm Berwin Leighton Paisner has won a three-year contract with the Highways Agency.London firm Memery Crystal has expanded its client base of brokers with Collins Stewart.London firm Davis & Co has been retained by Advance Production News - which offers business intelligence on television programmes and films - to uncover bootleggers who have been offering on-line cut-price replicas of APN's production guides.DLA has been appointed by South African Airways to advise on its long-haul wide-bodied aircraft fleet renewal programme.

It is looking for 15 more aircraft in a deal worth up to $2 billion.Addleshaw Booth & Co has won work on three new NHS hospital private finance initiatives, acting for NHS trusts in St Helens, Salford and Bradford on projects worth 516 million collectively.CMS Cameron McKenna's immigration team has been chosen to work in what it says is a pioneering scheme with City career management consultancy Penna Meridian.

They will provide solutions for executives from overseas who want to explore career options or have been made redundant.After a tender held by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, CMS Cameron McKenna is to advise the County of Constanta in Romania on a project to supply water and sewerage to up to one million customers.