Wake Up Call: Bayer Poaches Daimler CLO as New Legal Head

Welcome to Bloomberg Law’s Wake Up Call, a daily rundown of the top news for lawyers, law firms, and in-house counsel.

• German pharmaceutical and biotech giant Bayer AG has hired Daimler Truck AG chief legal officer and compliance officer Thomas Laubert as its new head of law, patents, compliance starting in July. A Bayer spokesman via email to Bloomberg Law confirmed the news, first reported by German legal news site Juve.de. Laubert will be based in Bayer’s headquarters in Leverkusen, Germany. He takes over the vacated post when Bayer’s former group general counsel Gabriel Harnier left for enterprise management software giant SAP SE earlier this year. Bayer’s corporate law chief Stephan Semrau will continue to act as interim head of legal until July. (BLAW)
• House Speaker Kevin McCarthy named Akin Gump partner Matthew Berry, a former law clerk to US Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, to serve as general counsel of the House of Representatives. Berry is a former Federal Communications Commission general counsel and chief of staff, and was a Justice Department counsel. (Speaker.gov)
• Kirkland & Ellis is reported to be considering launching an office in Saudi Arabia. (The Lawyer)
• The wave of law firm mergers continues. Chicago-based corporate law firm Croke Fairchild Duarte & Beres said it’s joining with Prendergast Layden, a seven-lawyer litigation boutique in the Windy City. The merged firm will have 84 lawyers and support staff and operate as Croke Fairchild Duarte & Beres. (CrokerFairchild.com) Braverman Greenspun, which represents condominium and cooperative boards in New York, said it’s combining with New York real estate boutique Finder Novick Kerrigan LLP to form a 21-lawyer firm. (BraverLaw.net)

Lawyers, Law Firms

• Young Big Law firm attorneys with big social media followings are disrupting the dealmaking dynamics at their firms. (Legal Intelligencer)
• Contract legal services provider Latitude hired former Womble Bond Dickinson partner Clark Goodman, the firm’s office managing partner in Charlotte, North Carolina, to open a Latitude office in the city. (LatitudeLegal.com)
• Littler Mendelson named office managing shareholders in Birmingham, Alabama, Cleveland, Ohio, and Fresno, California. (Littler)

Laterals, Moves, In-house

• Hinshaw & Culbertson grabbed a team of eight consumer financial services lawyers from Akerman in Texas and opened a new office in Dallas, its second in Texas. Partner Charles Townsend, Akerman’s Dallas office managing partner, is now partner in charge for Hinshaw’s new office, joined by partner Michael McKleroy and a team of six attorneys, one of whom joins the Houston office. (HinshawLaw.com)
• Goodwin Procter hired financial restructuring lawyer Debora Hoehne as partner in New York. She arrives after 15 years at Weil Gotshal. (GoodwinLaw.com)
• Cadwalader Wickersham & Taft grabbed a four-partner leveraged finance and private credit group from King & Spalding. Ronald Lovelace, Patrick Yingling, Jared Zajac, and Joseph Polonsky join Cadwalader’s Charlotte, North Carolina office. (Cadwalader)
• King & Spalding brought back private funds and real estate attorney Gibbs Fryer as partner in Atlanta. He was at the firm earlier in his career and rejoins from real estate operating company Evergreen Medical Properties, where he was co-founder and principal. (KSLaw.com)
• Manatt added two partners in Washington. Former US Senate committee health policy director and chief health counsel Nick Bath joins as health partner. Former National Electrical Manufacturers Association associate general counsel and Kelley Drye partner Bezalel Stern joins as consumer protection and advertising partner. (Manatt.com)
• Morgan Lewis hired capital markets attorney David Liao as partner in Hong Kong. He arrives from Fangda Partners. (MorganLewis.com)
• Cozen O’Connor added a four-lawyer securities and capital markets team in Toronto, Canada. (Cozen.com)
• Biotech company vTv Therapeutics Inc. hired industry in-house veteran Elizabeth (Betzy) Keiley as executive vice president and general counsel. She was general counsel at Entasis Therapeutics Inc. (vtvtherapeutics.com)

Promotions

• Effective Feb. 1, Foley & Lardner elected 23 partners; Nixon Peabody promoted eight attorneys to partner; Loeb & Loeb elected eight to partner. (Loeb.com)