Justin Henry

Group hires are having a moment, as one-off laterals often fail to attract clients while whole-firm acquisitions carry significant risks.

The firm first announced its strategy for expansion in the U.S. in late 2019, via combinations with a firm in Pittsburgh and another in the Midwest. Three more followed, but the last addition was over three years ago.

Structured finance has moved beyond mortgage-backed securities and into the broader economy. As a consequence, “leveraged finance lawyers need to understand structured finance and structured finance lawyers need to understand leveraged finance,” said attorney Michael Urschel, who arrived from Milbank last month.

Alice Hrdy spent three decades in government service and had been at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau since the agency’s inception in 2010.

“Salt Lake City is a great legal market and a fantastic city, but it’s not the right time for us to be there,” managing partner Richard Engel said Tuesday. The firm first opened there in April 2020.

The firm entered the market in 2012, eyeing a range of financial services work. But ultimately, the office wound up as a service outlet for litigation on behalf of clients located elsewhere.

“There are aspects of legal work I would really miss if I left it behind,” said Isabel J. Kim, whose unpublished debut novel Sublimation has been picked up by Universal International Studios.

Five of the eight lawyers in the new office come from FisherBroyles, including the partner who established the firm’s London presence in 2020.

“As much as people are trying to skinny-down their offices, getting rid of workrooms, getting rid of administrative stations, the experience of relative inefficiency is still happening,” said Thomas Fulcher, chair of the legal tenant practice group at Savills.

How a partner uprising over alleged financial mismanagement at an Am Law 100 firm led to one of the industry’s largest spinoffs—and fastest collapses.