Yesterday Elie offered some predictions for 2012. I’ll get even more specific and offer a prediction for January 2012: energy lawyers will be making moves this month.
January is generally a popular time for partner moves, and energy lawyers are popular people. Right now their practice area is as hot as New York City is cold. As you may recall, this time last year a slew of energy attorneys moved from McDermott to Cadwalader.
We’ve recently received word that at least two prominent partners in the energy space are switching firms. Let’s find out who they are and where they are heading….
UPDATE (2:30 PM): After the jump, we’ve added an update with additional context, details, and partner names. A source states that five partners are leaving and that the departures constitute a major move — a much bigger deal than our original report might have suggested.
Continue reading “Musical Chairs: Energy Lawyers in Motion”
In our recent post on the top 10 most generous large law firms — based on analysis by ATL’s new director of research, Brian Dalton — the firm of Hogan Lovells placed second. Under the rankings, this meant that Hogan partners are taking the second-biggest hit to their own bottom lines in order to keep their associates happy and well-compensated.
But is this still the case today? Based on what we’re hearing about the most recent Hogan bonuses, announced shortly before Christmas, one wonders whether the Ho-Love partners have turned from Santas into Scrooges….
Continue reading “Associate Bonus Watch: Hogan Lovells”
He was clearly the salesman-in-chief, and he did a darn good job at it. I remember being told that despite the fact that the economy was essentially collapsing around everyone’s heads, 2008 was going to come in well over budget with record revenues and profits.
– Andrew Ness, former managing partner of the D.C. office of Thelen LLP, commenting to Washingtonian magazine about former Howrey chairman Robert Ruyak, the poetry-writing power lawyer who lured Ness and his Thelen colleagues over to Howrey.
(Ness is now a Jones Day partner.)
(Additional excerpts from and discussion of Marisa Kashino’s interesting article, A Tale of Two Law Firms: Hogan & Hartson and Howrey, after the jump.)
Continue reading “Quote of the Day: Lawyer, Poet, Salesman”
Say hello to the Global 100 for 2011. This is the American Lawyer’s list of the world’s 100 largest law firms, ranked by total revenue.
There’s a lot of economic anxiety these days, with fears of a double-dip recession running rampant. But looking back — the list is compiled based on 2010 revenue numbers — the legal business seems to be hanging in there. As noted by Am Law, total revenue for the Global 100 increased by 3 percent last year.
Lawyers are a competitive lot. So you’re probably less interested in the overall figures than in how different firms fared in the rankings….
Continue reading “The Biggest Law Firms in the World: Meet the Global 100″
Neal Katyal
* “Dominique Strauss-Kahn Gets Off, As Did Everyone Else Who Stayed In His Room At The Sofitel.” Or: what you don’t want to know about your high-end hotel room. [Dealbreaker]
* F**k yeah — trademark law! Or: some reflections on the “immoral or scandalous” bar to trademark registration, by fashion lawyer Chuck Colman. [Law of Fashion]
* The New Jersey Supreme Court just issued a major new decision calling for changes in the way that courts handle eyewitness identifications — an issue that will also be going before SCOTUS in the coming Term. [The Innocence Project]
* Congratulations to Professor Neal Katyal, former acting U.S. solicitor general, who’s apparently headed to Hogan Lovells. [Am Law Daily]
* Professor Orin Kerr is not impressed by how Dean Linda Ammons has handled the controversy over Professor Larry Connell. [Volokh Conspiracy via Instapundit]
* They have lots of lawyers over at the IRS (former workplace of Michele Bachmann). Do you really expect them to be good at math? [Going Concern]
* Does signing a bill into law with an autopen present constitutional problems? Professor Terry Turnipseed explains how it might. [Slate]
* Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain thinks that President Obama’s decision not to defend DOMA constitutes an “impeachable defense.” [Poliglot / Metro Weekly]
Every day that major law firms do not announce spring bonuses makes them look like below-market, “non-peer” institutions. It has become very clear that firms claiming to pay market compensation need to be providing spring bonuses.
The latest firm to yield to market realities is Hogan Lovells. The relatively new Ho-Love, formed by the merger of Hogan & Hartson and Lovells, showed love to its hos on Friday. The firm matched the Cravath scale for spring bonuses.
You can read the full memo below. But you should also listen to how surprised and happy Ho-Love associates are about the bonuses. Hogan associates are like bizzaro Sidley associates….
Continue reading “Associate Bonus Watch: Ho-Love Gives Bonus Love”
Last week, Hogan Lovells announced its associate bonuses. It’s the first bonus season for the firm since the merger of Hogan & Hartson and Lovells. Unfortunately for some associates, the transatlantic deal apparently did not pay off for them at bonus time.
The memos are individualized, but the associates who have reached out to Above the Law are not happy. Here’s one tipster’s report:
Most people with whom I’ve spoken received $2500-$5000 less than the Cravath-model for billing around 2150 (our hours requirement is 1950). This is true no matter the class year.
A number of associates left the office as soon as the memos came out because they were so disgusted. I predict a mass exodus of associates leaving HoLove this coming year, because a lot of people have been pissed about the hours anyway and these bonuses are just insulting.
But according to a Hogan Lovells spokesperson, the HoLove bonuses matched the market. So why are associates upset?
(Please note that we’ve added some UPDATES after the jump.)
Continue reading “Associate Bonus Watch: Unhappiness at Hogan Lovells?”
The prior reports of additional payments to some associates at Hogan Lovells, designed to reward these associates for making their billable-hours targets, were accurate — at least with respect to the New York office. And it turns out that these payments constitute what in ATL-speak we call “true-up payments” — i.e., payments designed to give associates the pay they would have received had a salary freeze never occurred and they had received the customary annual raise for seniority.
This may sound confusing, but it’s really not. Let’s take a look at the memo from Hogan Lovells….
Continue reading “Nationwide Salary Thaw: Hogan Lovells Loves Its Associates”
Last Wednesday, the firm of Hogan Lovells — formerly known as Hogan & Hartson, before its recent merger with U.K.-based Lovells — made an announcement about associate salaries.
So what went down?
Continue reading “Nationwide Salary Thaw: Happy Happenings at Hogan?”
Supermodel Linda Evangelista famously quipped that she doesn’t wake up for less than $10,000 a day. Alas, not all models occupy such a privileged position. This summer, one model is getting out of bed for considerably less than $10,000 a day — to wit, about $3,000 a week.
Sara Albert, who made it to the final four on America’s Next Top Model – Cycle 6, has excelled in yet another reality competition. In a still challenging job market, Sara Albert — actually, now Sara Hallmark, since her 2008 wedding to John Hallmark — managed to snag a summer associate position in the Washington office of a major international law firm. A Biglaw biggie that just got bigger, as it turns out….
So, which fine firm will have its hallways graced by the 6’1” blond beauty?
Continue reading “Summer Associate of the Day: America’s Next Top… Lawyer?”
One merger is an accident. Two mergers … well, that could be a trend.
The merger of Hogan & Hartson and Lovells is in the books. The new firm is up and running, and it’s already saying goodbye to people. The Blog of the Legal Times reports that Hogan Lovells had some departures over the weekend:
A six-lawyer insurance litigation group left Hogan to launch a D.C. office for Hartford, Conn.-based Shipman & Goodwin. James Ruggeri, who leads the group, said that the move was made because of conflicts created by the merger for his group’s chief client, The Hartford Financial Services Group Inc. Ruggeri serves as The Hartford’s national counsel for complex insurance coverage matters. He had been at Hogan since 1991.
Hogan Lovells has gotten a lot of attention in part because it is the highest-profile law firm merger to take place after the recession fully took hold.
But over the weekend, a tipster reported that there might be another notable merger on the horizon. Our source tells us that Townsend and Townsend and Crew and Kilpatrick Stockton are in talks…
Continue reading “Law Firm Merger Mania? Townsend and Kilpatrick Might Be in Talks; Hogan Lovells Officially Debuts”
Not everybody from Lovells will be jumping on the Ho-Love bandwagon this May. Legal Week reports that Lovells will close its Chicago office:
Lovells is set to shut down its Chicago office by the end of October following a strategic and financial review of its business.
The office, which has seven partners and 15 fee earners, has been under review since before the firm’s merger talks with Hogan & Hartson began.
Not everybody can benefit from the something about synergy upside of the merger. But will these Chicago castoffs find new homes?
Continue reading “Nationwide Layoff Watch: Lovells Makes Cuts Ahead of May Merger”
* One secret to happiness is to make your bed each morning, says Gretchen Rubin, author of the Happiness Project and one of The Elect. (She got Lat to reveal his secrets last year.) [New York Times]
* Hogan & Hartson’s 38-lawyer Warsaw office is defecting to K&L Gates. [Blog of the Legal Times]
* Maybe this guy should have realized she was a dud when she told him “no one flies coach to Australia.” [Gothamist]
* Only net losers can recover money from Bernie Madoff, rules bankruptcy judge Burton Lifland. [Wall Street Journal and Business Week]
* The Supreme Court won’t rule on the Uighurs at Guantanamo. [New York Times]
* Brazil beckons Biglaw. [BusinessWeek]
On Wednesday, we commended the firm of Paul Hastings for moving so quickly to support Haiti earthquake relief efforts. Since then, a number of other top law firms have pledged their support to this worthy cause.
(Okay, Rush Limbaugh questions the worthiness of the cause. But we suspect that Limbaugh’s position — like that of Pat Robertson, who blames the earthquake on Haiti’s supposed pact with the devil — is a minority view.)
The WSJ Law Blog and Am Law Daily have gathered information about what various law firms are doing to help Haiti. We’ve combined their reports with information we’ve received from our own sources, to create a more comprehensive list.
Check it out, after the jump.
Continue reading “Update: More Law Firms Help Out Haiti”
Much of the recent talk about Hogan & Hartson has focused on their merger with Lovells. While transatlantic mergers thrill the imagination, back on the ground in the States, people are still concerned about their paychecks.
Hogan has long had a two-track salary system. The higher track paid market salary with the expectation that associates bill 1950 hours. The lower track paid less and had an 1800-hour billable expectation. Associates traditionally got to choose which track they wanted.
But Hogan turned its system on its head last spring. In April, Hogan placed associates in the lower salary track if they weren’t on target with their hours through the first quarter. The firm promised to pay the money back at the end of the year if associates did hit 1950 hours.
Well, here we are at the end of the year, and Hogan & Hartson is making restitution. And it’s paying a bonus. And it’s unfreezing salaries (although it’s not giving its people a “true-up” to where they would have been without last year’s salary freeze).
The Hogan salary structure for its two tracks, plus discussion, after the jump.
Continue reading “Hogan & Hartson: Bonus and Salaries for the New Year”
Last night partners at Hogan & Hartson and partners at Lovells voted on the proposed merger between the two firms. According to sources, Ho-Love will be coming to an office building near you.
Here’s the report on the partner vote, from a Lovells source:
Late last night, the voting closed on our proposed merger with Hogan & Hartson. We have also heard from Warren Gorrell, Chairman of Hogan & Hartson, on the outcome of their vote.
We are delighted to report that the respective resolutions at both firms were passed and, as a result, we will be combining with Hogan & Hartson with effect from 1 May 2010.
Bang. Mega-transatlantic mergers are back.
Read the full memo after the jump.
Continue reading “Hogan and Lovells Merger: All Systems Go”
Last month, we spent a week in D.C. doing reporting for “Why Lawyers Make So Much Money,” a piece we — used literally in this case, as it’s bylined by Kash and Lat — wrote for Washingtonian Magazine. We managed to find our way into the office of Robert Bennett, newly arrived at Hogan & Hartson from Skadden Arps. He gave us a tour of his memorabilia, though was miffed when he couldn’t find a photo from a fishing trip with Sandra Day O’Connor. (If you’ve read our piece, this story is a familiar one.)
While we were there, Bennett gave us a signed copy of his autobiography, In The Ring: The Trials of a Washington Lawyer. We mention this not to boast but so as not to run afoul of any blogger disclosure laws.
The book offers a retrospective on Bennett’s star-studded legal career, which includes stints as special counsel to the Senate during the Keating Five investigation; as defense attorney for Bill Clinton, Caspar Weingberger, and Judith Miller; and as a partner at Skadden Arps for twenty years, working on white collar crime cases.
A friend told us a story about D.C. power player autobiographies. When they come out, everyone rushes to the book store to get the book… then immediately flips to the index to see if they’re mentioned, and never opens the book again. This friend claims a journalist once put a piece of paper in the middle of a stack of books at the bookstore with his name and number and a message that said, “I don’t think people actually read these. Call me if you did.” Supposedly, his phone never rang.
Well, we did read Bennett’s book. It came out in 2008, so it’s already gone through a round of reviews, but we found it interesting to read in light of his unexpected move from Skadden to Hogan this year. From the tone of the book, one would have thought he was staying at Skadden forever.
We bring you some of the most interesting tidbits and words of wisdom from one of the greats in the legal field, after the jump.
Continue reading “Advice For Young Lawyers, From Legendary Litigator Bob Bennett”
Earlier this month, we mentioned that Hogan & Hartson and London-based Lovells were in “early stages of merger talks.”
Today brings the news that the firms are in “advanced talks to merge,” according to Nathan Koppel of the Wall Street Journal. But it’s not a done deal yet:
One of the biggest challenges to a Hogan/Lovells deal, lawyers say, will be marrying the firm’s contrasting styles. Hogan is considered relatively hard charging, paying partners based on how much business they bring in. Lovells take a more genteel approach, compensating partners based largely on their seniority.
UPDATE: Bruce MacEwen, who thinks that “this deal makes superb sense,” has a detailed analysis over at Adam Smith, Esq. (gavel bang: commenter).
A memo from Hogan head Warren Gorrell, plus selected comments from our prior post — we read the comments, so you don’t have to! — after the jump.
Continue reading “Law Firm Merger Mania: Lovells and Hogan & Hartson Talks Still on Track”
Back at the beginning of the legal recession, when Heller and Thelen were collapsing, there was talk that a number of firms would either have to fold or engage in mega-mergers.
For the most part, that hasn’t happened. But today, Legal Week is reporting that Hogan & Hartson and London-based Lovells are at least talking about merging:
Lovells and Hogan & Hartson are in the early stages of merger talks, Legal Week can reveal, with the firms’ management teams currently assessing the case for a transformative union.
Lovells is to discuss the proposed tie-up with the top 25 US law firm at a meeting of its international executive on 28 October. A deal would create a top 10 global practice in revenue terms.
With firms of this size, one imagines that merger talks will be complicated. And there is a lot that will have to happen for these firms to go from talking to combining. But if all the pitfalls are avoided, how big of a firm could we be looking at?
Details after the jump.
Continue reading “Law Firm Merger Mania: Lovells ‘Hearts’ Hogan & Hartson”
Sources at Skadden report that Robert S. Bennett, the legendary litigator, will be leaving Skadden for Hogan & Hartson. Skadden partners were informed yesterday; Skadden associates are being told right now.
Bob Bennett is one of the most famous trial lawyers in the world. His client list reads like a CNN promo: Enron, Bill Clinton, Judith Miller, Caspar Weinberger! That’s right, I kicked that list with the Cold War winning, Contra-loving SecDef.
Carl Rauh will also join Bennett at Hogan. Rauh has worked with Bennett on many of his high-profile cases, so that’s of little surprise.
But tipsters report that the two will not be taking any other Skadden – D.C. personnel with them.
Bennett started his private practice at Hogan & Hartson. So the move is a bit of a homecoming.
The associates’ meeting is about to kick off. We hope to have official confirmation from the firm and more news after the associates are informed.
The top brass at Hogan are surely excited about the Bennett acquisition — but might he be to blame for their missing out on the opportunity to meet Sex and the City stars?
Continue reading “Breaking: Bob Bennett Leaving Skadden for Hogan & Hartson”
