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As Heller Is Sliced and Diced, Many Associates Are Out in the Cold
The National Law Journal
October 15, 2008
As large groups of partners at Heller Ehrman have jumped on board other law firms in the past few weeks, one contingent of attorneys has been noticeably absent from some of the moves: associates.
To be sure, some associates at Heller Ehrman have landed jobs alongside the partners with whom they worked at the San Francisco firm. About one quarter of the more than 200 associates employed at Heller in the weeks before its dissolution, which its partners approved on Sept. 26, have announced moves to other firms.
But most of those attorneys specialize in areas that have been less affected by the downturn in the economy and revenue declines at Heller, said Alan Miles, of legal search firm Alan Miles & Associates in Los Angeles. "In intellectual property, chances are they took some or most of the associates," he said. "In corporate and commercial litigation, antitrust and securities, I don't think that group carried the business with them" to justify the hiring of associates.
On Wednesday, for example, Washington's Hogan & Hartson announced that nine partners and one attorney of counsel would join the firm to open offices in San Francisco and Silicon Valley, as well as add to its New York office. All the new hires practice in litigation, such as white-collar crime, securities, antitrust, commercial and labor and employment.
Noël Decker, a spokeswoman at Hogan & Hartson, said the firm planned to add Heller associates, but none have been officially hired so far.
Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe announced last week that 27 partners and one senior counsel from Heller Ehrman would be joining the firm. The hires come from a mix of practice areas, but the majority of them focus on antitrust and securities litigation.
A source familiar with hiring at Orrick, which also snagged Heller partners in intellectual property and insurance recovery litigation, said the firm was looking at hiring associates, although specific plans were uncertain at this point.
Also, Los Angeles-based Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton, which last week announced that four Heller partners in litigation and tax would join the firm, hired only one associate from the group.
One exception, however, is Washington's Arnold & Porter, which hired five partners from Heller focused on litigation, along with three associates.
The firm that has hired the bulk of Heller's associates so far is Washington's Covington & Burling, which opened offices in San Diego and Silicon Valley's Redwood Shores, Calif., with the additions. In all, Covington has hired 14 partners, six counsel and, by the end of this month, 30 associates all focused on patent litigation.
One of those partners, Alan Blankenheimer, now in Covington's San Diego office, hesitated to talk about the profitability of different practice areas at Heller. But he agreed that the intellectual property practice "was one of the strengths of the firm."
He said his group was able to bring in more associates because the 14 partners left prior to the firm's dissolution, paving the way for a more organized departure that accounted for the hiring of associates.
Cooley Godward Kronish also hired 18 associates this week after announcing that 15 former Heller partners would join the firm's offices in Seattle, Washington and Palo Alto, Calif. The new lawyers all come from Heller's Venture Law Group and focus on corporate and intellectual property work.
But, in a previous interview with The National Law Journal, Joe Conroy, chief executive officer of Cooley, admitted that the firm had to be cautious about future hiring of associates given today's economic climate.
