Tag Archives: dissolutions

Wishes and Predictions

While we are all relishing our last day of this holiday season and gearing up for 2019 and the inevitable challenges the new year will bring, we thought it may be worthwhile to offer a few predictions as to the landscape of BigLaw during the year to come:

  • At least one AmLaw 50 firm will dissolve or be acquired;
  • At least two AmLaw 100 firms will dissolve or be acquired;
  • There will be a record number of lateral partner moves among the AmLaw 100 firms;
  • There will be a record number of law firm mergers among the AmLaw 200 firms;
  • All but one of the current AmLaw 50 firms will post increased revenue over 2018;
  • 48 of the current AmLaw 50 firms will post increased profitability over 2018;
  • AmLaw 50 firms will see record numbers of partner departures leaving to join boutiques or start boutiques of their own;
  • No transatlantic merger of Global 50 firms will be consummated.

With those predictions on the table, we look forward to reviewing each of our major firms’ reports of their own 2018 performance and tracking their respective performances in 2019 — wishing all of them the best of luck as the gun goes off bright and early tomorrow morning and while we commence our own 19th year of offering support to their attorneys and managing partners as they face their inevitable challenges over the course of the upcoming twelve months!

The Shrinking Pack of BigLaw Front Runners

As we enter the final ten of days of calendar year 2017 and contemplate resolutions and goals for the coming year, we take a moment to shift our focus and glance into the rear view mirror at the twelve months we are soon to leave in our wake.   From the perspective of this market observer, BigLaw 2017 looks like mile 17 of a marathon, with a handful of firms racing neck and neck, leading a pack of elite runners which is growing smaller mile by mile.

In terms of strategy, dominance for law firms can theoretically be attained by organic growth, individual attorney or group lateral acquisitions, smaller firm acquisitions or the rare merger-of-equals, but with the race for global market dominance among the few remaining elite-of-the-elite international firms only gaining intensity and more major-city markets being effectively closed to potential late-comers, law firm mergers and acquisitions have increasingly been defining competitive strategy over the last two decades, with 2017 being a record-setting year with about 100 law firm acquisitions tracked.  See  https://biglawbusiness.com/law-firm-mergers-on-record-breaking-pace-in-2017/.

The venerable London based firm of Norton Rose is a case in point, its 2017 acquisition of former AmLaw 100 stalwart Chadbourne representing only a piece of their current merger plans and recent merger history.  See  http://www.legalweek.com/sites/legalweek/2017/06/30/chadbourne-name-disappears-as-norton-rose-merger-goes-live:  “Norton Rose, the product of a 2013 mega-merger between Houston-based Fulbright & Jaworski and London-based Norton Rose, has expansion plans beyond Chadbourne.  Since the February merger announcement with Chadbourne, the Swiss verein announced plans to unite with Australia’s Henry Davis York … Norton Rose has been through a succession of major mergers.  It merged with Australian firm Deacons in 2010, then in 2011 with Canadian firm Ogilvy Renault and leading South African firm Deneys Reitz. These were followed by a second Canadian merger with Calgary’s Macleod Dixon in 2012, while legacy Norton Rose’s union with US firm Fulbright & Jaworski went live in summer 2013. The firm also inked a deal with Vancouver-based firm Bull Housser & Tupper in September 2016.”

With AmLaw100 firms disappearing at the rate of about one every year and a half, the question of which among them will be the next to fade away is fodder for odd makers.   But look to 2018 to see more BigLaw acquisitions and consolidations than ever before as the leading pack in the race for global dominance continues to shrink and the rest of the market grinds to remain viable.

37 Signs That Your Firm May Be Sinking

It does not take a legal market expert to know that the landscape of major law firms is changing like that of the polar ice caps. Since 2000 at least nine firms have collapsed from their perches amidst the Am-Flawed 100 directly into oblivion, namely: Dewey & LeBoeuf, Howrey, Heller Ehrman, Thacher Proffitt, McKee Nelson, Wolf Block, Dreier, Thelen, and Brobeck — or on average one firm every one and a half years.

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