The Ince Group’s former partner in Germany says it is not affected by the UK law firm’s troubles after parting ways just days before it applied to go into administration.
Ince Germany in Hamburg ended its relationship with Ince on 31 March 2023 and rebranded as ANCON BLUE LAW.
Ince notified its intention to file for administration on 12 April.
ANCON BLUE partner and managing director Jan Hungar told TradeWinds that the split was amicable and without problems on either side.
Hunger said he was aware of the difficulties at Ince, but had no indication that it was about to file for administration in the days ahead.
“The current matters regarding our former cooperation partner, the Ince Group in London, which are circulating in the media since yesterday, have no effect on the ANCON BLUE Group,” Hungar said.
The ANCON BLUE Group includes a law firm as well as a tax advisory and consultancy arm. Hungar said he wanted to clarify it is independent from Ince in all its businesses.
“Contrary to other international offices of the Ince Group, ANCON BLUE LAW (formerly Ince Germany) as well as ANCON BLUE Tax & Trust (formerly Ince Tax & Trust) were never corporately and financially integrated, but exclusively licensees of the brand name “Ince”.
“ANCON BLUE Consultancy UG (formerly Ince Consultancy UG) is also no longer part of the Ince Group,” he said.
As a former long-standing partner at Ince, he said he hopes Ince can make a recovery.
“We still have an Ince soul in us but we have terminated the relationship mainly for compliance reasons. We left Ince as friends,” Hungar said.
