Adding five partners to an office in the space of two working days is a tidy piece of business by anybody’s standards. On Monday Linklaters announced the hire of King & Spalding investment management partner Stephen Cullhane (see story). The hire came hard on the heels of the recruitment of a four-partner litigation team from White & Case, the subject of last Friday’s blog.
If Linklaters and its UK magic circle rivals are going to build their own New York offices from the ground upwards, they are going to have to become canny recruiters. There is certainly evidence of some nifty footwork surrounding Linklaters’ hire of the White & Case team, which also included 12 associates. The bulk of this group formed its own discrete unit, having only joined the New York firm four years ago, following the merger of their firm, Squadron Ellenoff Plesent & Sheinfeld with Hogan & Hartson. Lawrence Byrne and Joseph Armao and a team of six assistants, two of who subsequently became partners, ended up at White & Case because of conflict problems. Their subsequent move to Linklaters suggests they did not settle in their new home.
