Summary: The leaders of Bingham McCutchen and Morgan Lewis announce their plans to merge.
Bingham McCutchen realized their dreams of finding economic stability, amidst the tides and turbulence of the recent legal market, by finally landing a suitable merger partner: Morgan Lewis. The 750-strong Bingham has struggled lately, with financial issues mounting and partners leaving, and so took on a new leader, Steven Browne to replace Jay Zimmerman. If the merger goes through – and what is left for this to happen is for the partners to put it to vote – Morgan Lewis’ lawyers would combine with Bingham’s for a total of around 2,000 lawyers, and $2 billion in revenue, rendering them one of the top five largest firms in the world.
This is incentive enough for Morgan Lewis, which has a strong labor and employment practice, representing the Mortgage Bankers Association. Lacking that, they would have less to gain from the combination than the evidently distressed Bingham.
Whatever the case, with today’s harsh legal market, consolidation and unification are a favored tactic to ensure firms can give businesses, who are strapped and demanding cheaper legal representation, exactly what they are looking for.
News of this merger shouldn’t come as a surprise to anybody familiar with the firms. They’ve been courting since July. And you know they mean business, considering that Bingham McCutchen has lost 22 attorneys disappointed with news of the merger.
Want to work with USA’s top law firms? Click here to browse available attorney openings only on LawCrossing.com