IJGlobal Investor Awards 2025 – Energy M&A Lawyer

Frankfurt-based Latham & Watkins partner Alexander Stefan Rieger was chosen by the independent panel of judges to win the award for IJGlobal Investor Energy M&A Lawyer of the Year.

One of the judges said that Stefan had demonstrated “clear leadership across the firm on all aspects of advisory services as well as value creation for clients”.

Stefan (pictured right) is an established energy and infrastructure M&A partner in Latham & Watkins’ Frankfurt office and serves as the firm’s regional corporate chair for Continental Europe.

His clients include leading infrastructure funds, pension funds, insurance companies, private equity investors, and corporates worldwide.

For several years, Stefan has been a prominent figure in the German and European infra and energy industry, advising on complex, international, high-calibre transactions across the digital infrastructure and energy transition sectors.

He has built an excellent reputation and has advised clients such as Apollo, CVC DIF, GIC, DWS, DTCP, UBS, iCON, and ICG in some of the most complex infrastructure and energy deals in the market.

Having joined Latham as a partner in 2023 and successfully transformed his business from national to pan-European, he is renowned for adding value rarely available at the interface between infrastructure and M&A.

The submission states: “Stefan is an essential part of the team, has experience across the full range of asset classes and is an innovator in new and emerging asset classes such as digital infrastructure and energy transition.

“He set up and hosts the Latham Infra Circle, a new event series for leading figures in the E&I (investment) community, providing an exclusive platform for exchanging trends and challenges. Each event focuses on a specific industry segment and features external speakers.

“Based on its success in Germany, it is now being implemented in other European offices. Additionally, Stefan engages in broad thought leadership activities from client briefings, to LinkedIn formats, to videos, and is a valued interlocutor for the media.”

The submission continues: “Stefan played a key role in introducing a successful ‘infra-readiness’ tool, enabling private equity clients to assess whether their portfolio companies may be reclassified as ‘energy and infrastructure’ assets – a well-received tool with several live instructions already completed as it allows for private equity style assets to be sold to infrastructure investors for higher returns or for refinancings to take place with infrastructure debt providers rather than with conventional lenders.”

With Stefan playing a key role, Latham’s German and European E&I practice has continued its growth path.

The practice has been strengthened and broadened, and the firm identifies its USP as being a combination of globally leading corporate/M&A capabilities and in-depth commercial agreements / infrastructure market sector knowledge, which – according to client feedback – is a unique preposition.

The submission states: “This approach has led to a substantial increase in new top clients for the practice. In Europe, Stefan is working closely with Latham partners Conrad Andersen and John Guccione and a team of more than 150 industry specialists, integrating expertise across Latham’s global platform.”