Morgan Lewis Completes Its Conquest Of Bingham McCutchen
How many Bingham people, both lawyers and staff, are joining Morgan Lewis?
Yesterday Morgan Lewis announced the completion of its transaction with Bingham McCutchen (a firm that is expected to expire at some point in the future). The deal involves Morgan Lewis taking on 226 partners and more than 525 other lawyers, legal professionals, and staff from Bingham — about 750 people in all.
In our most recent story, we reported that 300 “legal professionals,” a category including non-partner lawyers and paralegals, would be making the move. Based on the Morgan Lewis announcement, it seems that more than 200 non-legal staffers will be going from Bingham to Morgan too. From the press release:
With almost 2,000 lawyers in 28 offices in the United States, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East, Morgan Lewis offers clients global access to broad capabilities across a comprehensive spectrum of services and industries addressing virtually every aspect of corporate, financial, and asset management operations. With the addition of its new lawyers, the firm has a dominant presence along the East and West coasts of the United States and opens new offices in Santa Monica, California, and Hartford, Connecticut.
“Our strategic decisions have always been driven, first and foremost, by our clients’ needs,” said Morgan Lewis Chair Jami McKeon. “In welcoming more than 750 talented lawyers and staff from Bingham today, we continue to build a firm that is capable of mobilizing teams to partner with clients on their most pressing legal and business challenges wherever they arise around the globe.”
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I imagine McKeon rubbing her hands together and proclaiming with glee, “Now witness the firepower of this fully ARMED and OPERATIONAL battle station!” According to the Philadelphia Inquirer, Morgan Lewis will be the #1 firm in the U.S. by lawyer headcount and one of the top five worldwide. (I wonder if that excludes vereins; if you look at the latest Global 100 rankings, 2,000 lawyers and $2 billion in revenue is good for a spot in the top 10 but not the top five.)
Some issues related to the deal remain outstanding:
McKeon said there are aspects of the acquisition that need to be worked out. For example, the two firms have duplicate offices in a number of cities, including Boston, New York, and Washington, and sorting out how to merge those groups will take several months. Morgan also still is evaluating Bingham’s back office operation in Kentucky to see what portions fit well with its existing back office staff in Philadelphia.
Ah yes, Bingham’s “Global Services Center” in Lexington, Kentucky. We continue to hear expressions of discontent about how the Lexington situation is being handled, such as this one:
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It is very clear that there is zero intention to keep the Global Services Center in Lexington. Everyone in Lexington has term dates of 12/31/14, 3/31/15, or 6/31/15. We were told that there would be a few permanent positions posted, but they would all be in other cities. There is absolutely no way that office is going to continue – everyone is being sacked.
I personally left a very good job to go to the GSC (I was recruited there). Several people relocated from places across the country. Now we are all forced with scrambling to find a new job. One young woman in particular just gave birth to twins, one of whom was still in the hospital. She was one of the unlucky few that were terminated immediately. She was notified of this via phone while she was in the hospital spending time with her newborn in the NICU….
Severance being offered is absolute s**t. The offer letter sent to Lexington employees was full of errors and misspellings. Looks pretty bad on ML if you ask me.
Or this one, arguing that it’s actually better to be one of the people getting immediate walking papers:
I am a Bingham employee who has been offered a “transition period ” position [into 2015]. I read your article stating that Morgan is claiming the GSC is still Bingham’s and “actions being taken with respect to Lexington staff” are Bingham. This conflicts with what we are being told, which is that… Morgan is definitely in charge and directing Bingham’s actions. The employees who are being terminated [around now] are the lucky ones, guaranteed severance, paid out vacation and unemployment. Those of us backed into a corner having to accept offers from Morgan are the ones getting screwed.
It sounds like the holidays won’t be very happy for certain residents of Lexington. But to look on the bright side, this whole situation is at least better than if Bingham had just straight-up gone bankrupt — and that is probably something to be grateful for as Bingham’s former or soon-to-be-former employees sit down to their Thanksgiving meals.
(Flip to the next page to see the memo that Jami Wintz McKeon sent to clients about the Morgan Lewis / Bingham deal, as well as links to other coverage.)