Hawksmoor Investment Management, a boutique firm specialising in discretionary portfolio management, has acquired the assets of Ashton Graham, a firm of solicitors in East Anglia in the UK.

The acquisition brings £30 million ($43.6 million) of assets to Hawksmoor, increasing its total to approximately £45 million. The terms of the deal were undisclosed.

Following the acquisition, the four members of Ashton Graham’s investment team will relocate to Hawksmoor’s Ipswich office.

“Ashton Graham’s investment business is a good fit with Hawksmoor. We share similar attitudes to asset allocation, fund selection, and critically, client care and service,” said John Crowley, chief executive of Hawksmoor.

The acquisition of Ashton Graham is Hawksmoor’s first and Mr Crowley said the boutique would be looking to acquire solicitor investment managers in the future. Such opportunities might arise, he said, if firms found that "new generation" partners regarded investment management as a non-core business activity, a situation which is increasingly likely in the current economic climate.

Mr Crowley added that Hawksmoor had beaten a “major competitor” to snap up Ashton Graham and cited taking a non-aggressive approach as a reason for its success.

Hawskmoor was founded in January 2008 by Mr Crowley, who was previously head of investment management at the iimia financial services group. In November, the firm appointed Richard Scott as chief investment officer, who had previously been a senior fund manager at iimia Wealth Management, a subsidiary of Midas Capital.