Eloïse Gratton joined the team at Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt after nine years with Borden Ladner Gervais.Stephanie Foden/The Globe and Mail
Legal Moves is a monthly roundup of job changes at Canada’s law firms.
In a major move in the world of privacy law, Eloïse Gratton has joined the team at Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt in the Montreal office, bolstering what is already the largest dedicated privacy group at a Canadian firm.
Ms. Gratton, who had been with Borden Ladner Gervais for more than nine years, made the jump after getting to know the Osler group during a regulatory matter.
Early last year, Ms. Gratton, who is ranked in Band 1 by Chambers Canada in the area of privacy and data management, was retained by a large tech company to help with a regulatory investigation. But the company wanted Ms. Gratton to join forces with the chair of the Osler group, Adam Kardash.
This type of arrangement is still uncommon but not unheard of in the high-stakes tech world, where companies that are found to have run afoul of the law can find themselves on the hook for large fines.
“We really enjoyed it,” Ms. Gratton said. Over the holidays in 2023, they started to think about working together permanently.
“We had a long conversation. You’re wrapping up the year. It’s ‘Wow. This has been an interesting experience.’ We’re almost sad it’s going to come to an end. And that’s when the discussions really got going.”
Ms. Gratton said they already knew it would be a great fit culturally, given how well they had worked together. Professionally, the groups were a great strategic fit.
“We have complementary strengths and capabilities,” she said. “The idea is to leverage the best of both teams to create a privacy powerhouse.”
She said there have been major shifts in the sector recently. In Quebec, which she says was the first jurisdiction in Canada to enact privacy laws, significant changes came into effect last fall that include major fines for violations. Similar federal legislation is on the table.
Eloïse Gratton's move to Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt bolsters what is already the largest dedicated privacy group at a Canadian firm.Stephanie Foden
Meanwhile, because of the huge risks, clients have become highly sophisticated internally with large privacy teams. She said they reach out with the “million-dollar questions” and strategic advice.
“Even mid-market in the last few years, it used to be that privacy was not their problem, but now it’s everyone’s problem because everyone is managing a large volume of data and subject to important fines,” she said.
BLG’s François Joli-Coeur and at least two associates are also heading to Osler. Ms. Gratton will become co-chair of the practice at Osler with Mr. Kardash.
May was a busy month for Canadian law firms, with lots of movement across the country.
Litigator Katherine Booth, formerly of McCarthy Tétrault, has joined Bennett Jones as a partner in Vancouver. “My practice focuses on class actions and commercial litigation,” she said. “What we’ve seen in the last few years is British Columbia has become a really active class action jurisdiction … The really exciting opportunity for me with Bennett Jones was the ability to join their existing market-leading class action and litigation practice, but to also get in on the ground floor of growing their local group here in Vancouver.”
Miguel Manzano has jumped to Stikeman Elliott’s Montreal real estate group as partner. This comes after a three-decade career at Norton Rose Fulbright. Mr. Manzano’s practice focuses on real estate transactions, commercial contracts, project finance, mining, acquisitions and joint ventures.
At Dentons, Matthew Epp came on board as a partner in the litigation and dispute resolution group in Calgary. The firm also announced that Manveer Bisla will be joining the corporate and venture technology groups in Vancouver as a partner.
At Miller Thomson, Michael Blatchford and Bryan Millman joined the charities and not-for-profit group as partners in Vancouver. Also coming on board as associate counsels are Michael Clifton, who specializes in condominium law, and Mark Kok, whose area of expertise is in land development law.
Meanwhile, Norton Rose Fulbright announced that Nicolas Labrecque is the new office managing partner in Montreal. And BLG announced that Lisa Chamandy has become the firm’s first chief AI officer, which they say is a new role among Canadian law firms.
Finally, Kip Daechsel, formerly Heenan Blaikie’s national co-managing partner, is now senior counsel with Founders. And Ricketts Harris announced a number of moves: Michael Foulds has joined the firm’s litigation group as a partner, and Ron Kugan and Adam Veroni have joined the business law group as partners.
Keep The Globe up to date on your people moves: rdoolittle@globeandmail.com
Robyn Doolittle