Portfolio Media. Inc. 111 West 19 th Street, 5th Floor New York, NY 10011 www.law360.com Phone: +1 646 783 7100 Fax: +1 646 783 7161 customerservice@law360.com Law360 Reveals The Global 20 Firms Of 2018 By Jacqueline Bell Law360 (July 4, 2018, 10:02 PM EDT) -- What makes a law firm truly global? What does it take to handle the biggest and most complex cross-border matters? These firms know. In first place on this year s Global 20 list is White & Case LLP. The New York City-based powerhouse topped Allen & Overy LLP, closely followed by DLA Piper and Freshfields. Herbert Smith Freehills LLP and Norton Rose Fulbright tied to round out the top five in our eighth annual ranking of the most global firms. These firms have the broadest global reach and the proven ability to handle the most difficult crossborder matters, from multibillion-dollar mergers to heated legal brawls. In order to stick the landing in cross-border matters, these firms need not only inspiration and creativity, but also a huge stable of legal talent in offices around the globe. The average Global 20 firm has attorneys manning offices in nearly two dozen countries, and more than half of those attorneys are far from the home office if the firm has a formal home office at all.
While size is a factor, it isn t the only thing that counts. All of these firms qualify as legal behemoths, but they range in size from Shearman & Sterling LLP s ranks of nearly 900 lawyers to Dentons army of more than 8,700. While Law360 looks at the number of offices and attorneys a law firm has around the world, we also look at the complexity and variety of the cross-border work it has done over the past year. All the firms in the Global 20 are standouts in the global legal marketplace, racking up high-profile wins in international legal battles and nimbly handling cross-border transactions, often on tight deadlines. Every firm has its own market priorities, and many have strengths in particular regions. But some cities are must-have office locations. All Global 20 firms have an office in New York, London, Hong Kong and Beijing, and most have them in familiar hotspots like Dubai, Singapore, Frankfurt and Brussels. For many firms, outposts in less well-known locations are also a key factor in their ability to pull off truly global legal practices. From Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, to Almaty, Kazakhstan, to Darwin, Australia, these law firms have attorneys everywhere their clients need them. Global 20 firms have offices in nearly every corner of the world in more than 250 cities, in more than 90 countries, and on six continents.
These firms are also pushing into new locales, continually expanding their reach and ability to serve a broader range of clients. As Britain prepares to leave the European Union, for example, many of the Global 20 firms have been opening offices in more cities that are set to remain in the bloc, creating the potential for new legal hotspots in Europe. Eversheds Sutherland and Norton Rose each opened an office in Luxembourg. Linklaters LLP and Eversheds also cut the ribbon on new offices in Germany, joining the law firms looking to further capitalize on the country s thriving financial industry as major banks move operations from London. Milan s growing pharmaceutical industry also captured the attention of Herbert Smith Freehills, and the firm opened an office there with an eye toward nabbing a share of the region s intellectual property work. Other law firms have been placing bets on the Asia-Pacific region. Mayer Brown LLP put down new roots in Tokyo this year, with the firm opening up an office to handle project finance and international arbitration work as well as mergers and acquisitions in the Asian city.
In a bid to boost its Southeast Asia practice, Herbert Smith Freehills opened up an office in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, adding to its reach in the top business centers of the region: Singapore, Jakarta and Bangkok. The Kuala Lumpur office will also serve as a hub for the firm s Islamic finance expertise. Australia also continues to prove irresistible for Global 20 firms, as they are continually looking to improve their bench strength and reach into the smallest continent, either by opening their own offices or by combining with local firms. In one recent example, Norton Rose announced a deal to combine with Australian firm Henry Davis York in June 2017, adding Canberra to its office location portfolio. Meanwhile, some law firms have been focusing on Central and South America, while others are boosting their offerings in the U.S., setting up shop in Texas to capitalize on the white-hot legal market there. Several firms kicked open office doors in Texas and lured top regional talent to staff them up. Orrick and Shearman & Sterling opened offices in Austin, and White & Case jumped into Houston. In Central and South America, Norton Rose Fulbright increased its reach dramatically when it merged with Chadbourne & Parke LLP in June 2017, giving Norton Rose a new presence in Mexico City and São Paulo, Brazil. Dentons, meanwhile, picked up a base in Lima, Peru, and landed another location in San Salvador, El Salvador, in February. As the world gets ever more interconnected with each passing year, law firms and attorneys are looking for more ways to ensure that their business caters to global companies and international professionals. Scoring high-stakes cross-border work certainly
isn t the exclusive domain of Law360 s Global 20. Some smaller firms are also weighing whether to grow their presence overseas. But it must be done carefully, legal industry watchers say, with specific targets and talents in mind. Law firms should also have a realistic expectation of the costs involved, which can be staggeringly high. Whatever their specialty, these legal globetrotters have at least one thing in common: They keep their bags packed and their passports handy, ready for the next cross-border opportunity. --Additional reporting by Brandon Lowrey and Amanda James. Editing by Jeremy Barker and Emily Kokoll. Methodology: Law360 surveyed law firms about their global attorney headcounts, office locations and cross-border and international work between April 1, 2017, and March 31, 2018. Headcount and office information is as of March 31, 2018, except for Cleary Gottlieb, which is as of Dec. 31, 2017, and Sidley Austin, which is as of May 31, 2018. Firms are ranked based on five factors: the percentage of the firm's attorneys located outside its home country; the number of offices outside the firm's home country; the number of countries where the firm has at least one office; the practice area breadth of the firm's crossborder and international work; and the size and complexity of the firm's cross-border and international work. If a firm has no designated home country, Law360 used the country where the most attorneys are based as a home country in order to calculate the firm s rank. All Content 2003-2018, Portfolio Media, Inc.