DLA Piper has announced that it is hiring five partners from the firm of Hogan Lovells.

The five partners hired by DLA Piper, to work in the firm’s Washington office, include the following:

Kevin J. Lipson, the co-head of Hogan’s energy practice, with Lipson focusing mainly on the natural gas sector.

Lee A. Alexander, Stefan M. Krantz, John R. Lilyestrom and Christopher R. Schindler are the remaining four partners to join DLA Piper.

Warren Gorrell, the co-chief executive for Hogan Lovells said in a statement, “While we wish our former colleagues well, it’s important to keep in mind that Hogan Lovells has a global platform with more than 200 high-quality energy lawyers working with many of the world’s leading energy companies.”

The recent hiring move by DLA Piper of these five partners continues a trend of aggressive hiring by the firm, which has over 4,000 lawyers, making it one of the largest law firms in the world based solely on the number of lawyers employed.

In 2011, DLA Piper hired quite a few big name lawyers including James D. Wareham formerly of Paul Hastings Janofsky & Walker and Gregg Galardi formerly of Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom. It has been reported that DLA offered Wareham $5 million per year to lure him away from his previous firm and join DLA Piper.

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Law firm Jenner & Block LLP announced the addition of six partners to its commercial entertainment and media litigation group in its Los Angeles office. The attorneys join from the Los Angeles office of Hogan Lovells US LLP.

According to the November 10^th businessweek.com article, “Jenner & Block Hires Partners From Hogan Lovells in Los Angeles”, Jenner & Block said in a statement the partners included Richard L. Stone, an antitrust and copyright lawyer in the media and entertainment industries; Kenneth D. Klein, a contract and antitrust attorney; Carissa C.W. Coze, a corporate transactions specialist; Amy M. Gallegos, who specializes in entertainment and media industry commercial litigation; intellectual property and entertainment litigator Julie Ann Shepard; and David R. Singer, an entertainment and media litigator. All will work in the Los Angeles office.

Stone was quoted as saying in the businessweek.com article: “We have been working together as a team for many years and the opportunity to move together to work at Jenner & Block to help build upon its existing group of leading media and entertainment clients was ideal. This was the perfect fit for us and where we see our practice expanding well into the future.”

The addition of this group will increase the total number of attorneys in the Los Angeles office to 26.

Clients the group has represented recently include News Corp. as well as many of its current and former subsidiaries, such as Fox Broadcasting Co., Dow Jones & Co., Harper Collins Publishers Ltd., and MySpace Inc.

Rick Richmond, a managing partner in Los Angeles was quoted as having said in a phone interview the businessweek.com article: “We expect them to fit right in with what they’ve been doing, which is high-octane commercial litigation.”

Stephen Kay, Hogan Lovells’s managing partner of its Los Angeles office, was quoted as having said in a phone interview of the attorneys that were leaving: “Some of them have relationships (with clients) that I imagine they will seek to continue. This is, in the scheme of things, not going to have a significant impact on our West Coast practice.”

Jenner & Block was founded in 1914, and has approximately 450 attorneys who are located in Chicago, Los Angeles, New York and Washington, DC. The firm has established transactional and corporate practices, which focus on mergers and acquisitions, securities, finance, private equity, real estate, tax, environmental, insurance, commercial law, technology, intellectual property, bankruptcy and reorganization, labor and employment, executive compensation, government contracts, health care and associations.

Jenner & Block is widely known as a leader in public service and pro bono advocacy. The firm has been consistently ranked as one of the top ten pro bono firms in the country by The American Lawyer magazine, and in 2010, The American Lawyer recognized Jenner & Block as the number one law firm in the country for pro bono service for the third year in a row. In addition, the firm has received the Pro Bono Institute’s John H. Pickering Award, Public Interest Law Initiative’s Pro Bono Initiative Award,  DC Bar’s Pro Bono Law Firm of the Year Award, the prestigious Pro Bono Publico Award from the American Bar Association, and many more.

International law firm Hogan Lovells is co-headquartered in London, United Kingdom and Washington, D.C., United States. It was formed on May 1, 2010 as a product of the merger of Washington-based Hogan & Hartson and London-based Lovells. Together, the two firms employ an estimated 2,500 attorneys in 40 offices.

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Former Chief Counsel of the Food and Drug Administration Ralph S. Tyler and former insurance Commissioner of the State of Maryland, has joined Venable. He will work out of both the Baltimore and Washington, DC offices.

Tyler’s career spans over thirty five years in the practice of law. He will join the firm’s Litigation and Regulatory Divisions. He was quoted as saying in a press release at the firm’s website: “I look forward to the opportunity of practicing law with the lawyers at Venable, many of whom I have known and admired for years.”

Before holding the position of Maryland’s Insurance Commissioner, Tyler served as Chief Legal Counsel to Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley and as Baltimore City Solicitor. He also served as a partner in the international law firm Hogan & Hartson LLP; the firm is now known as Hogan Lovells. Prior to that, he served in the Maryland Attorney General’s office holding the titles of Deputy Attorney General, Chief of Litigation and Assistant Attorney General.

Mr. Tyler holds a B.A. from the University of Illinois, a juris doctorate from Case Western Reserve University, and a LL.M. from Harvard University.

Jim Shea was quoted as saying: “We are delighted that Ralph has chosen to join Venable. For years, we have admired both his skills and his commitment to the State of Maryland.  Ralph will be an enormous asset to our firm and for our clients. He brings cutting edge knowledge of the regulatory climate in Washington and a superb resume as both a litigator and a thought leader.  Welcome to Venable, Ralph.”

According to information at fda.gov, litigators at the Office of the Chief Counsel (OCC), which is the Food and Drug Division of the HHS Office of the General Counsel, handle both civil and criminal enforcement cases, and defend challenges to provisions of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FDCA), the implementing regulations, and FDA policies, initiatives, and decisions.

The litigators work closely with agency compliance personnel to ensure an adequate evidentiary foundation for enforcement matters, prepare referrals to the Department of Justice, draft memoranda setting out the agency’s interpretation of the law, develop case strategy, conduct negotiations, prepare and respond to discovery, and are key participants in hearings, trials, and appellate proceedings. The litigators act as the liaison to the Department of Justice during active litigation, and in many criminal prosecutions have been asked to work as Special Assistant United States Attorneys, assuming primary responsibility for prosecuting violations of the FDCA or related statutes. The litigators frequently work closely with senior officials at the Department of Justice and play an active role in all of FDA’s cases, including matters before the United States District Courts, the Courts of Appeal, and the United States Supreme Court.

Venable was founded in Baltimore in 1900, and is headquartered in Washington, D.C. With over 500 attorneys practicing in over 70 practice and industry areas covering corporate and business law, complex litigation, intellectual property and regulatory and government affairs, the firm has seven offices throughout the country.

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The law firm of Cowan, DeBaets, Abrahams & Sheppard LLP recently announced the addition of two partners, Mary E. Rasenberger and Eleanor M. Lackman, both of whom are well known in the copyright and trademark fields. Both attorneys will join the firm’s digital media and intellectual property practice.

Rasenberger joins the firm from Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, where her practice focused on copyright and digital media. For over twenty years, she has worked in the area of intellectual property, with a focus on copyright law and technology.

Her experience includes the counsel of clients in a broad range of fields, including internet, publishing, entertainment, technology, media and technology; her areas of specialty include policy, litigation, infringement analysis, and licensing.

Significant cases in which Rasenberger has been involved include Viacom v. YouTube in the Southern District of New York and Second Circuit, UMG v. Veoh in the Ninth Circuit, and Reed Elsevier v. Muchnick in the Supreme Court, for which she drafted amicus briefs on behalf of rights holders.

She also represented Houghton, Mifflin, Harcourt in a series of lawsuits brought by photographers, and represented several software companies in major copyright infringement and trade secret litigations.

She also represented clients in the Google Books Settlement and in DMCA rulemaking proceedings. She has also advised a variety of Internet and entertainment companies on copyright law in the online environment, and handled major transactions involving the acquisition and licensing of copyrights and related properties.

Before returning to Skadden in 2008, Ms. Rasenberger served as a Policy Planning Advisor for the Register of Copyrights; as well, she managed the National Digital Infrastructure & Information Preservation Program (NDIIPP) at the Library of Congress. In addition, she worked in the IP and technology groups of both a major record company and New York law firms.

Rasenberger was quoted as saying in a press release at the firm’s website: “I am thrilled to be joining new and old friends at CDAS. The firm’s deep expertise across all areas of entertainment and media law and high degree of professionalism have impressed me. CDAS is the perfect match for my practice in copyright and digital media. The expertise that Eleanor and I bring to CDAS will create terrific synergies for existing CDAS clientele and will help to grow the practice.”

Lackman joins from Hogan Lovells. She has broad experience in copyright, trademark and commercial litigation and counseling, especially in the areas of IP and new media.

She has provided representation to clients in a wide range of industries, including those in media, entertainment, luxury goods, consumer products, and telecom, in scores of federal and state court lawsuits at trial and appellate levels, as well as in arbitrations, domain name dispute proceedings and contentious matters before the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board.

Significant cases in which she has been involved include Capitol Records v. Naxos of America in the Court of Appeals of New York, Cartoon Network v. CSC Holdings and Tiffany v. eBay in the Southern District of New York and Second Circuit, U.S. v. ASCAP (In re Yahoo! and RealNetworks) in the Second Circuit and Supreme Court, and Capitol Records v. Thomas in the District of Minnesota. In these cases, which involved complex IP issues, she represented litigants or amicus parties.

She has also counseled a wide variety of clients in matters regarding copyright, trademark and technology licensing, and exploitation and enforcement.

Lackman was quoted as saying in the same press release at the firm’s website: “Cowan DeBaets provides a concentration of in-depth expertise in copyright, trademark and digital media law that not only rivals that of other leading firms of all sizes, but is on a trajectory of growth. The ability to match that expertise with business-conscious rates was a real draw for me to join the firm.”

Located in New York, New York, Boutique law firm Cowan, DeBaets, Abrahams & Sheppard (CDAS) has provided legal counsel to leading media and entertainment clients for over twenty-five years, offering them expert services regarding copyright, trademark and media disputes.

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The Moscow office will be King & Spalding’s 17th worldwide and will work closely with the firm’s extensive transactions practices in London, the historic legal centre for transactions originating in Russia, as well as its highly regarded international arbitration practice in Paris, an important venue for Russian disputes.

The office will open in Moscow following receipt of government registration. The move has been much anticipated in the expansion of King & Spalding’s top-ranked international energy practice. The office will have close ties to the firm’s existing operations in the global energy centres of Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Riyadh, Singapore, Houston, London and New York.

King & Spalding chairman Robert D. Hays, Jr. was quoted as saying in a press release at the firm’s website: “We see this as an opportunity to turn heads and achieve instant critical mass in Russia by bringing together five well-established Moscow-based lawyers from two respected firms. Moscow is another example of our focus on expanding our global footprint by investing in high-value practices where we are already strong and in markets where our clients are seeking our expertise.”

Garry Pegg, King & Spalding’s co-managing partner in London and a former partner at Hogan Lovells who has worked extensively in Russia was quoted as saying: “A strong presence in Moscow has long been considered a key element of our international growth strategy, particularly for transactions-related assignments. The team we have created is of the highest quality and a great fit personally and professionally. It also enhances our ability to serve clients in and from London and across all legal disciplines and market sectors, including energy and life sciences.”

King & Spalding has a long history of representing clients across the Commonwealth of Independent States. 

Olga Kozyr, Alla Naglis and Sergey Komolov join the firm as partners, and Iliya Zotkin as counsel, all from Hogan Lovell. Jennifer Josefson joins as partner from White & Case.  

Komolov will be the resident office managing partner in Moscow. Komolov practices in the areas of mergers and acquisitions, private equity, finance, restructuring and general corporate law and has represented some of Russia’s largest corporations and banks in connection with groundbreaking transactions and major cross-border disputes.

Kozyr practices in the areas of corporate and real estate law, international and Russian litigation and life sciences, and represents U.S. and European companies engaged in investments in Russian.

Naglis focuses on cross-border transactions, mergers and acquisitions, and telecommunications, media and entertainment law, and has extensive experience in antitrust and intellectual property matters.

Josefson has been based in Moscow since 2002 and is consistently ranked as one of the leading energy and natural resource lawyers in Russia.

King & Spalding is an international law firm with more than 800 lawyers, and represents half of the Fortune 100.

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Cherian leaves Howrey for rival firm, Hogan Lovells, and joining him will be partners Constance Ramos, Sarah Jalali, John Hamann, and hiring partner at Howrey’s Scott Wales. On top of the loss of partners, Cherian also takes $10 million worth of business with him.

Hogan & Lovells was formed in May 2010, when Washington-based firm Hogan & Hartson merged with the London-based Lovells. With revenues of around $1.8 billion, there are nearly 2,500 lawyers at Hogan Lovells.

Howrey lost its other IP rainmaker last month, when Henry Bunsow left to join Dewey LeBeouf.

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The number of partners that switched firms in 2009 was artificially high, driven by several large firm closures.  A full 15% of partner laterals in 2009 came from 4 firm closures.  2010 lacked the high profile closures but had a significant number of partner moves as a result of a few large mergers.  The Hogan Lovells merger and the Sonnenschein deal contributed 90 laterals to the yearly total.

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Lisa Murkowski won her bid to be returned to Washington as Alaska’s Senator…

Boies Schiller let three female associates go late last week…

Sidley Austin’s Matthew Sheridan was promoted to practice Co-Head…

Mintz Levin Co-Chairs will be the featured speakers at MIT Conference…

McGuire Woods finalized an agreement to combine operations with the Houston-based firm of Nickens Keeton Lawless Farrell & Flack LLP…

Hogan Lovells added two partners to its firm, one in Philadelphia, and one in Washington, D.C….

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Virginia A. Gibson, former Executive Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, joins as a partner in the Philadelphia office and a member of the Litigation, Arbitration and Employment practice group.

Lynn Whipkey Mehler, former U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Senior Counsel for Drugs, joins as a partner in the Washington, D.C., office in the Pharmaceutical and Biotechnology practice group.

Gibson is a highly qualified investigation, litigation, and trial lawyer who has worked as a U.S. federal prosecutor for 24 years, serving most recently as the Executive Assistant U.S. Attorney in Pennsylvania where she oversaw all healthcare and government fraud, among other matters. She has also served as First Assistant and Chief of the Civil Division in that office.

Prior to her work for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, Gibson was with the Office of the U.S. Attorney for the District of Delaware, where she held the positions of First Assistant, Executive Assistant U.S. Attorney, and Civil Chief. Her tenures in both U.S. Attorneys’ Offices have placed her at the forefront of civil False Claims Act and qui tam enforcement as well as civil and criminal enforcement of the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act and other government fraud statutes. Gibson has played a central role in some of the largest and most significant pharmaceutical and medical device prosecutions the U.S. Department of Justice has undertaken in recent years.

Gibson has received numerous awards for her work from the Department of Justice and the Attorney General, including one she will receive on 6 December for a major pharmaceutical fraud matter. Other agencies, including the President’s (and the IG’s ) Council on Integrity and Efficiency, the Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General and the FDA Office of Criminal Investigations have recognized her fraud prosecutions.

Mehler has 12 years experience at the FDA, and served as one of the principal lawyers to the agency’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER). She was responsible for supervising the work of a number of lawyers. She has also counseled senior FDA officials on a broad range of legal issues involving federal regulation of pharmaceutical and biotechnology products, including drug safety, drug labeling, risk management, post-marketing studies and trials, and the federal regulation of controlled substances.

Hogan Lovells combines the breadth of business-oriented legal advice and high-quality service that clients have come to expect through working with its two founding firms – Hogan & Hartson and Lovells.

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Reed Smith added leading IP strategist Marc Kaufman to its Washington D.C. office…

For four years running, Greenberg Traurig had more attorneys listed in the annual The Best Lawyers in America Guide than any other firm…

Barnes & Thornburg hired Peter Zura as a partner in its IP division…

DLA Piper gained a 5 person IP team from Hogan Lovells…

TEX-ABOTA Inc. named Richard A. Sayles, acclaimed courtroom lawyer, “Trial Lawyer of the Year”…

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Joining DLA Piper are partners Richard de Bodo, Siegmund Gutman, Robert Benson, Christopher Broderick and Troy Schmelzer. Additionally, Hogan Lovells of counsel Lawrence McClure is leaving the firm to be a partner at DLA Piper.

De Bodo is a former IP practice head at Hogan Lovells and his clients include Dow Jones & Co. and News Corp., the NLJ reports.

According to the story, the team has experience in Japanese electronics, life sciences, and pharmaceutical matters among others. Most of its work includes patent litigation and patent prosecution.

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LegalWeek reports the firm is entering the country through a formal alliance with Mongolian firm GT’s Advocates. According to LegalWeek, Hogan Lovells is the first transatlantic firm to enter Mongolia.

Partner Michael Aldrich, formerly of Lovells’ Beijing office, will head up the practice in the East Asian country. He will continue to work with his clients in China in addition to his new role.

According to LegalWeek, Mongolia’s economy has been on the rise during the last 10 years because of its expanding trade partnership with China.  Major industry in the country includes mining, natural resources and agriculture.

Hogan Lovells was launched May 1.

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According to Hildebrandt Baker Robbins, leading consultants to the legal industry, law firm merger activity picked up during the second quarter…

Profits per partner were up 10 Percent at Allen & Overy…

Baker Botts’ Robert W. Jordan, former U.S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia, returned as partner in charge of the firm’s Middle East offices…

The Los Angeles based firm Munger Tolles & Olson placed for the third year running at the top of the American Lawyer A-List…

Francis P. Barron,  a partner from Cravath, Swaine and Moore, joined Morgan Stanley as its chief legal officer…

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That marks a rise in activity from the four completed mergers in the first quarter of 2010, and the nine completed mergers in the second quarter of 2009. Two additional mergers have been announced which are slated to be completed during the third quarter of 2010.

Despite the pickup in activity in the second quarter, merger activity year-to-date still lags that of 2009 by a wide margin with 14 mergers in the first half of 2010 compared with 42 in the first half of 2009.

Lisa Smith, head of Hildebrandt Baker Robbins’ Law Firm Strategy and Merger practices, said, “As we predicted, merger activity is back on track after three very quiet quarters. We are seeing significant interest in combinations, including a dramatic increase in interest in cross-border transactions. We expect the second half of the year to continue to show increased merger activity.”

The largest merger involving at least one U.S. firm in the second quarter of 2010 was the cross-border merger between Hogan & Hartson and the U.K.’s Lovells. This trans-Atlantic combination is the second largest merger completed since Hildebrandt Baker Robbins began tracking law firm mergers, the largest being the 2005 merger between London’s DLA and Chicago’s Piper Rudnick Gray Cary.

The next-largest pairings in the second quarter were New Jersey law firm McElroy, Deutsch, Mulvaney & Carpenter and Connecticut-based Pepe & Hazard, and New Orleans’ Jones, Walker, Waechter, Poitevent, Carrere & Denegre with Birmingham’s Walston Wells & Birchall.

The average size of the smaller firm in second-quarter U.S. mergers was 164 attorneys, compared with the average size of 14 in the second quarter of 2009. The high average figure for the quarter was driven by the Hogan-Lovells merger, with both firms having well over a thousand attorneys each. Three of the mergers involved an acquisition of more than 20 lawyers.

Globally, nine mergers were completed in the second quarter of 2010 involving at least one non-U.S.-based law firm. The largest of these was again the Hogan-Lovells merger. Other large international mergers during the quarter included the pairing of offshore law firms Mourant du Feu & Jeune and Ozannes, and the merger of Spanish law firms Vialegis and Dutilh Abogados. There was one intra-Canadian merger: Atlantic Canada’s Cox & Palmer with Halifax firm Goldberg Thompson.

Six international mergers are currently scheduled to be completed during the third quarter of 2010, including the cross-border pairing of Sonnenschein Nath & Rosenthal LLP with U.K. firm Denton Wilde Sapte to create SNR Denton.

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A team of five energy transaction lawyers left the newly formed Hogan Lovells for King & Spalding…

Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo established a scholarship in Herman Mintz’s name, one of the firm’s original name partners…

Three attorneys from Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel were named to Human Resource Executive magazine’s 2010 list of Most Powerful Employment Attorneys…

Seyfarth Shaw added one partner and one of counsel to its L.A. office…

Corporate Intl Magazine Global Awards named Sadis & Goldberg LLP the 2010 Corporate Advisory Firm of the Year in New York…

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Joining Pegg are partner Hywel Jones, counsel Nina Howell and associates Leon Sosnowski and Susanna Marshall. Pegg was the co-chair of the global energy and natural resources practice at Hogan Lovells as well as the London office managing partner of its predecessor firm, Hogan & Hartson.

Jones practices in the corporate and commercial area, with a particular emphasis on the energy and natural resources sector, international project development and finance, mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures, and corporate finance.

“This significant addition to our London office and our global energy team is yet another demonstration of our unwavering focus on building in our areas of strength and of our adding new capabilities and the best lawyers in their respective areas of expertise,” said Robert D. Hays, Jr., King & Spalding’s chairman, in a press release.

King & Spalding is an international firm with more than 800 lawyers and offices in Abu Dhabi, Atlanta, Austin, Charlotte, Dubai, Frankfurt, Geneva, Houston, London, New York, Paris, Riyadh (affiliated office), San Francisco, Silicon Valley and Washington, D.C.

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Sacramento DA Jan Scully said amid a $6.9 million budget cut for the next fiscal year her office will be laying off 50 employees…

The newly-formed megafirm Hogan Lovells made its first lateral hire…

Vincent A. Marchetti joined the Tampa office of Greenberg Traurig, P.A. Marchetti as shareholder…

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Layman’s practice provides advisement to public and private companies in a variety of industries, including clean energy and technology, electronics, contract manufacturing, homeland security, semiconductors, life sciences, natural products and organic agriculture.

“This is an exciting time in the development of Hogan Lovells,” Layman said in a press release. “The depth, diversity, and global reach of Hogan Lovells will be an outstanding platform to serve my clients. I welcome the opportunity to further my practice as part of Hogan Lovells’ highly-regarded corporate team.”

Hogan Lovells refers to the international legal practice comprising Hogan Lovells International LLP, Hogan Lovells US LLP, Hogan Lovells Worldwide Group (a Swiss Verein), and their affiliated businesses, each of which is a separate legal entity.

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The story reveals Hogan’s New York large corporate practice is in line for further expansion in order to broaden its transactional reach to Washington D.C.  Firm officials are also banking that Lovells corporate practice in London, which LegalWeek reports as being undersized, will be able to lure more high quality lawyers through the merger. Andrew Skipper, who heads the practice, said the firm is already in discussions with several potential laterals.

Other priorities for the merged firm are to build a bank-led finance practice in the U.S. , given Hogan’s finance practice is currently focused on corporate clients, and  increasing the firm’s position in the market with U.S. underwriters in capital markets, deals finance, and structured products, LegalWeek reports.

Additionally, the firm plans to immediately exhibit to its existing client base the positives have having a firm the size of Hogan Lovells.

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K&L Gates opened a Moscow office in January and is represented in Western Europe with offices in Berlin, Frankfurt, London and Paris.

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ABC’s new legal show premiered last night to terrible reviews…

Hogan Lovells announced its board of directors…

NBC is paying Conan O’Brien to go away, and we looked at the legal talent involved in the dispute…

The Supreme Court handed down its decision in the Citizens United case, and there were no surprises…

Former White House Deputy Counsel John Farren pleaded not guilty to charges resulting from an altercation with his wife…

President Obama nominated five US Attorneys…

and Fortune Magazine’s list of top 100 companies to work for includes six law firms…

Enjoy your Friday everyone, and have a great weekend!

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The Hogan & Hartson contingent is led by CEO Warren Gorrell, who will be the co-CEO of the combined firm. Also from Hogan are Claudette Christian, David Dunn, Gernod Meinel, Michael Silver and Jun Wei. Christian will co-chair the board along with her counterpart from Lovells.

Lovells will be represented it its CEO and the other co-CEO of the combined firm, David Harris. Harris is joined by Marc Gottridge, Jose Maria Balana, Nicholas Cheffings, Andreas Meyer, and John Young. Young will serve as the other co-chair of the board.

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The discrepancy is caused by the way the two firms calculate the numbers. Altman Weil calculates mergers when they are announced, while Hildebrandt, which just completed its own merger as of January 1, counts them upon their completion. So, taking the Hogan Lovells merger as an example, Altman Weil calculated it into the mix for 2009 while Hildebrandt won’t count it until this year’s report.

A more accurate way to relay the information would be to say that the number of announced mergers was down in 2009, while the number of completed mergers was up.

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Kahn has a mergers and acquisitions practice focusing on cross border mergers for both US and Foreign companies. He says the move is unreleated to the pending Hogan Lovells merger. He was attracted to Seyfarth Shaw because the firm offers “more transparency and predictability” in billing rates and cost predictability is important to his clients.

Chicago’s Seyfarth Shaw LLP is a full-service law firm founded in 1945. It has ten offices, nine of which are in the United States. The firm is well known for its labor and employment, employee benefits, litigation and business services.

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• Morning Roundup

Sonnenschein lays off some staff and abandons lockstep compensation….

WilmerHale also ditches lockstep….

Nixon Peabody associates get a last minute deferral…

and the partnerships at Hogan & Hartson and Lovells have approved the merger plans…

• Morning Roundup
• Morning Roundup
• Holiday Roundup
• Morning Roundup
• Morning Roundup

The combined firm will instantly become one of the world’s largest with over 2,500 attorneys around the globe and revenues in the range of $2 billion.

• Hogan & Hartson and Lovells to Become Hogan Lovells
• Hogan and Lovells Set Priorities Prior to Merger
• Hogan Lovells Names Board
• Hogan & Hartson in Merger Talks with Lovells
• Six Partners Jump from Hogan Lovells to Jenner & Block in LA

I don’t know about the rest of you, but I was secretly hoping for Hogan Lovells Hartson.

• Hogan & Hartson in Merger Talks with Lovells
• Hogan Lovells Merger is on Track
• Law Firm Mergers Ramp Up in Second Quarter
• Hogan and Lovells Set Priorities Prior to Merger
• Hogan Lovells Names Board