Lisbon-based Miranda has announced a new member to the firm’s international alliance, Rio de Janeiro's Bichara Barata Costa & Rocha Advogados (BBCR).

The Miranda Alliance already consists of eight firms operating across nine countries: Angola, Cape Verde, Equatorial Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Macao, Mozambique, Portugal, São Tomé e Príncipe and Timor.  

The addition of BBCR extends particularly Miranda’s noted energy, oil and gas practice into one of Latin America’s most dynamic markets, and where recent offshore discoveries have the potential to raise Brazil among the world’s major oil and gas producers.  

In a sign of commitment to the new project, Miranda lawyers from Lisbon have been transferred to Rio de Janeiro, the firm says, to help demonstrate that the tie-up is more than a mere referral arrangement. 

The Brazilian market is one in which international law firm interest is clearly on the increase, and in the last few months alone has seen the arrival of firms including Allen & Overy and Simpson Thacher & Bartlett, while US-based Chadbourne & Parke is also reported to soon open.  

Nonetheless a number of Portuguese firms already have long-established referral arrangements, among them, Morais Leitão with Mattos Filho Veiga Filho Marrey Jr e Quiroga, Vieira de Almeida with Pinheiro Neto, and PLMJ with Tozzini Freire Advogados.  

Likewise, the leading Spanish firms are also well-represented: Uría Menéndez has ties with Dias Carneiro Advogados, Cuatrecasas with Machado Meyer Sendacz e Opice, and Gómez-Acebo & Pombo is aligned to Pinheiro Neto.