Wednesday, July 29, 2015

LOS ANGELES DAILY JOURNAL

By Joshua Sebold

LOS ANGELES – Sidley Austin LLP has poached two prominent partners from Manatt, Phelps & Phillips LLP in Los Angeles, furthering the firm’s aggressive lateral recruitment push throughout California and especially in L.A.

Trial lawyer Chad S. Hummel and Clayton S. Friedman are the latest notable partners set to jump ship for Sidley next month, the firm announced Tuesday.

Sidley has increased its attorney headcount in California by more than 8 percent in the past year, adding 19 partners between the beginning of 2013 and July 1 of this year. Over that period of time, the firm’s Palo Alto and Los Angeles offices both added six partners, while the San Francisco office added four.

The firm has been gobbling up prominent leaders from rival Los Angeles offices in an effort to give it an infusion of talent and a significant brain trust of attorneys who know the local market well.

Among those recent transplants is Dan Clivner, a mergers and acquisitions rainmaker who joined Sidley in May from Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP and is now helping co-manage the Los Angeles office after serving as office leader at his former firm.

Clivner said he was drawn to Sidley because of the firm’s strong vision for Los Angeles, a region that he believes many firms ignore or maintain simply to have an office.

“There is a tremendous commitment to the Los Angeles market and growing our practice and office,” he said.

Chicago-based legal consultant Kent Zimmermann, who has advised Sidley’s leadership team over the years, agreed that the firm was taking a different approach than its competitors.

“My own sense is that if you take a look at a number of the indigenous Los Angeles firms, many of them, as a percentage of their overall headcount, are shrinking in L.A. relative to the rest of the world,” he said. “Sidley has seen an opening in the market and they have doubled down on that market while others have taken their eye off the ball.”

Hummel is another addition with significant leadership chops, as co-chair of Manatt’s trial practice and chair of firmwide strategic development.

“He’s just a terrific guy,” Clivner said. “A leader, a wonderful talented trial lawyer and he’ll come in to help lead our trial practice initiative at Sidley nationally.” Hummel has represented director Roman Polanski and sued the National Football League Players Association, the NFL’s union, on behalf of former players.

He added that Friedman’s regulatory experience working on state investigations across the nation and background as a deputy attorney general would be a great benefit to clients on their most sensitive issues.

Hummel and Friedman weren’t available for comment. Sabina Lippman, the legal recruiter who brokered the move, declined to comment.

In an emailed statement, Manatt CEO and managing partner William T. Quicksilver said “Clay and Chad are our friends and we wish them the best.”

Michael C. Kelley, the other co-leader of Sidley’s L.A. office, pointed to the additions of Clivner in M&A, Matthew C. Thompson, an entertainment partner who joined from Stroock Stroock & Lavan LLP in May and complex litigation and regulatory partner Michael L. Mallow, who joined from Loeb & Loeb LLP in December.

“All three of those practice areas are ones we identified as strategically important,” Kelley said.

The firm also added Joel H. Rothstein, an international real estate partner, to its L.A. office in June.

“Joel has a rather unique set of skills and experience having spent so many years in Asia,” Kelley said.

The firm has also been adding to its Northern California offices. Intellectual property litigator Michael J. Bettinger joined from K&L Gates LLP in April, corporate partner Martin A. Wellington came aboard from Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP in July and mergers and acquisitions partner Jennifer F. Fitchen decamped from from Cooley LLP in February.

Legal recruiter Larry Watanabe, who brokered Bettinger’s transition to Sidley but wasn’t involved in Hummel and Friedman’s move, said most firms chase books of business, looking for attorneys who can bring a sizable list of new clients with them, but Sidley has been playing a more patient game.

Watanabe said Sidley is confident in its client list and that the firm has been looking for quality practitioners to serve those clients’ various needs – rather than looking for waves of new business from each lateral.

“In Sidley, they really analyze the talent base, what they’ve done with past representations, and they try to match and correlate that to their current client base,” he said. “They feel by acquiring the upper-tier talent they’ll be able to service their clients across the board.”

Watanabe said many firms lack the platform and built-in client base to follow that strategy. He added that Sidley’s complete lack of debt and strong profits are also key factors in being able to employ these tactics.

“They run themselves like a major Fortune 100 company. They’re conservative and manage the money very, very well and they’re taking advantage of the market,” he said.

Clivner said the firm doesn’t plan to sit on its laurels and has further additions in the works. “We’re at the start not at the finish,” he said.