Goodwin Proctor has recruited biotechnology lawyer Stephen Ferruolo from Heller Ehrman to launch an office in San Diego. Ferruolo is also vice president and general counsel for Biocom, the region’s biotechnology industry organization. Partner Ryan Murr, several associates and a paralegal are also leaving Heller Ehrman’s life sciences practice for Goodwin Proctor. The firm’s new San Diego office is a part of its “California initiative”; Goodwin now has two offices in LA, one in San Francisco, and one in San Diego.
Source: www.signonsandiego.com
Peter Mostow, the head of the renewable energy practice at Stoel Rives, has left for Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, along with John Pierce, another partner in the practice. Mostow will work in Wilson Sonsini’s San Francisco office, while Pierce will be based in Seattle. The partners’ departure was a sound choice considering that Wilson Sonsini has close ties to the venture capital community and a tendency to jump into up-and-coming practice areas; moreover, San Francisco is ideal for Mostow since California boasts a booming renewable energy field. Last month five other partners left Stoel Rives’ San Francisco office; the firm now has 14 lawyers there.
Source: www.law.com
Thelen Reid Brown Raysman & Steiner LLP has added three partners and an associate to its growing
downtown Los Angeles office. To accomodate this expanding office, the firm recently opened an additional floor at 333 South Hope Street. The four new hires were needed to handle real estate finance deals and class action litigation. Real estate finance specialist David Fong joins Thelen from Stroock & Stroock & Lavan and will be the contact person for the firm’s real estate finance practice in Southern California. Class action expert and appellate law specialist Steven Katz joins the Labor and Employment Department from Jones Day. Real Estate partner Jarrett Fugh will split his time between the firm’s Los Angeles and San Francisco offices, and Real Estate associate Martha Bringas will also move to the downtown Los Angeles office from Century City to assist on real estate finance deals. Since Thelen’s December merger, the firm has increased the number of deals it is doing on the West Coast; the firm has already handled more than $1 billion in West Coast deals for major investment banking clients.
Source: www.prnewswire.com
Loeb & Loeb has hired Thomas Guida for its Intellectual Property and Entertainment group. Coming from Baker & Hostetler, Guida joins the New York office as a partner. His practice focuses on the development, licensing, financing and protection of intellectual property assets, with a particular emphasis on digital and interactive media, branded entertainment, entertainment technology and complex licensing transactions. Guida is the fourth lateral partner hire in the past two months for Loeb & Loeb’s IP group; the firm has plans to add two more soon. Loeb & Loeb is a national firm with offices in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Nashville.
Source: www.lawfuel.com
With the departure of the global IP head and last remaining Palo Alto partner, Daniel Harris, Clifford Chance’s California operations are officially closed. Though the original plan was for Harris to move his IP practice to the Washington office after the closure of the Palo Alto office, he decided to stay in CA, leaving the firm altogether. In 2002, Clifford Chance had four offices on the West Coast; by 2002, however, Harris was the only attorney left. The firm has not announced a successor for Harris yet.
Source: www.thelawyer.com
Seattle-based Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro has opened an office in San Francisco to better serve their clients, local tech companies. The firm is known for its plaintiffs work managing multistate national class actions in securities, antitrust and consumer fraud cases. Specifically in the Bay area, Hagens Berman is involved in the DRAM (Dynamic Random Access Memory) and SRAM antitrust cases. To head the new office, the 38-lawyer firm recruited former Lerach Coughlin Stoia Geller Rudman & Robbins partner Reed Kathrein; he will also be in charge of the LA branch. Joining Kathrein in San Francisco are two associates and an of counsel from the Lerach firm.
Source: www.law.com
San Francisco based firm, Littler Mendelson, announced today its merger with five-lawyer Portland firm Amburgey & Rubin PC. Just two months ago Littler finalized its largest merger ever with a 46-attorney labor and employment boutique in Cleveland. Littler has grown by 120 attorneys over the past year, mostly gaining small groups from other labor and employment firms. Currently, the firm has over 600 lawyers in 42 offices nationwide.
Source: www.sanfrancisco.bizjournals.com
Nixon Peabody has acquired 17 intellectual property lawyers from Jenkens Gilchrist. All but one of the attorneys will be joining the Chicago office; the other will work in Los Angeles. These IP lawyers specialize in patent litigation, a particularly profitable area. This group departure is just one of many faced by Jenkens over the past months.
Source: www.bizjournals.com
A group of nine health care lawyers recently left Foley and Lardner for local San Diego firm Procopio, Cory, Hargreaves and Savitch. According to George Root Jr., the head of the moving group, the departure is mostly due to rising rates at Foley. Those increasing rates were making it hard to retain clients and recruit new ones. Though in recent years small local firms have been facing increasing pressure from larger international firms, other attorneys have made similar moves, especially those with price-sensitive clients. For the group from Foley, Procopio’s option for a flexible work schedule was also a draw. Procopio has 110 lawyers in its downtown San Diego office, along with a second office in Carlsbad.
Source: www.signonsandiego.com
San Francisco boutique, Topel & Goodman, is set to merge with New York firm Kasowitz, Benson, Torres & Friedman on April 1. The seven-lawyer boutique has made a name for itself in white-collar criminal defense, but the firm’s two partners feel that Kasowitz’s 230 lawyers will help to provide the backup needed to take on larger criminal cases and ancillary civil cases. For Kasowitz, the deal provides criminal defense capabilities and a West Coast presence. Kasowitz Benson focuses on general litigation, creditors’ rights and bankruptcy, employment, intellectual property and family law. The two firms hope to double the number of lawyers in the San Francisco office in the next year.
Source: www.law.com
Foley & Lardner has expanded its Los Angeles operation with the addition of a downtown office to its existing Century City location. The new 53,000 square-foot office is located at 555 S. Flower St. in City National Plaza. The firm now has 20 offices worldwide with seven located in California. While the Century City office continues work in intellectual property and the entertainment industry, the downtown office will focus on its growing corporate and litigation practices.
Source: www.globest.com
Boston firm Goodwin Proctor has opened two new offices on the West Coast. The 700-lawyer firm opened in San Diego and Los Angeles, and is considering a Silicon Valley office opening in the next six months. With its acquisition of former Heller Ehrman partners, Stephen Ferruolo and Ryan Murr, the San Diego office will specialize in technology and life sciences. Managing Partner, Regina Pisa, expects to hire about 25 lawyers, including eight partners, for that office. The LA office will open with Dean Pappas and Dani Vogt, former partners at Mayer, Brown, Rowe & Maw, as well as Edward Hagerott Jr., previously with Munger, Tolles & Olson. With the addition of several associates, this office will eventually employ 11 attorneys.
Source: www.law.com
