Biglaw

Checking In On 'Allen & O'Melvery,' Biglaw's Most Hilarious 'Will They Or Won't They' RomCom

The Allen & Overy and O'Melveny deal appears star-crossed at the moment, but we've got hope.

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When news broke that senior leadership from Allen & Overy and O’Melveny & Myers were deep in merger discussions, the Biglaw landscape let out a collective gasp. The proposed mega-merger would result in a 3,000-attorney firm bringing in roughly $2.8 billion in annual revenue. At first blush, the deal made a lot of sense. A&O wants to bulk up its North American presence, while O’Melveny has been on the prowl for a merger partner for some time now.

We’re all basically the romantic comedy best friends who know these two are perfect for each other, but we’ve got a symbolic 90 minutes of dreck to fill, so of course they’re not going to make this merger easy.

The first wrinkle cropped up within minutes of American Lawyer breaking the merger story, when O’Melveny reached out to flatly deny that they’ve ever planned to merge with anyone. Oh, O’Melveny. You’re only lying to yourself. Get over your stubborn pride and go to her!

Allen & Overy, meanwhile, confirmed that they were in talks with an unnamed firm but tried to play it cool. But if they succeeded in presenting a stiff upper lip to the public, internally they faced a downright breakdown. As ALM’s Rose Walker has it, a number of key partners in A&O’s London’s headquarters are “dead against” merging with O’Melveny, and they’re heading to the press with their concerns:

Although Allen & Overy partners were informed at the start of the year that the firm was talking about a potential U.S. tie-up, no names had been presented to partners before last Friday. News of discussions with O’Melveny surprised many, with one source describing the initial reaction in some quarters as “quite violent.”

One Allen & Overy partner told Legal Week that most of the firm’s London office are “dead against” the proposed merger, while another senior partner who recently left the firm said that “lots of people in London do not want this.”

Why the turmoil? Well, as you’d expect, some think the British girl is just too good for the rough-and-tumble American. O’Melveny’s bad-boy image as a litigation-focused firm just doesn’t fit the mold some people have for Allen & Overy. All that courtroom fighting is no place for a prim-and-proper banking firm. Other sources note that the proposed merger would leave Allen & Overy with more work to do — they’d have a larger American beachhead, but they’d need to expend considerable resources bulking up the O’Melveny transactional side to deliver what they feel their clients need. Just like every one of these movies… she’s going to have to change him before this all works out.

While things look bleak right now for this Biglaw tie-up, we’re still relatively early in the saga and there’s more than enough time to set things right. Just get ready for the second act, where Allen & Overy wildly misinterprets O’Melveny chatting with former prospective merger partner Willkie Farr & Gallagher and O’Melveny has to run to the airport before A&O flies out of O’Melveny’s life forever.

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Allen & Overy Faces Skepticism Over O’Melveny Merger as Doubts Emerge Among Partnership [International]

Earlier: Allen & Overy And O’Melveny Are Considering Merger (Please Name It Allen & O’Melvery)
O’Melveny Tells ATL ‘We Have No Plans To Merge And Never Have.’

HeadshotJoe Patrice is an editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news.

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