Wake Up Call: Big Firms Said Likely to Defer First-Years

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

• With demand for corporate transaction work dramatically down, some “enlightened” Big Law firms will likely soon move to defer their first-year associates’ arrival, predicts Hugh Simon, a former senior partner at The Boston Consulting Group and chief operating officer at Ropes & Gray. If that happens, Simon argues, the new law school graduates should strongly consider the offer, which would likely include a stipend and health insurance. (American Lawyer)The stipends are likely to be a fraction of what associates would earn if they started working on time, observes a legal blogger. (Above The Law)
• Hogan Lovells represented Michele Kang, controlling owner of National Women’s Soccer League team Washington Spirit, on her agreement with France-based Olympique Lyonnais Groupe SA to create a woman-owned multi-national, multi-team women’s football organization. (HoganLovells.com) Kang was also represented by Northridge Law in London, according to a report. (Yahoo! Sports)
• Covington & Burling could get $8.3 million in attorneys fees for work in a six-year arbitration dispute against Venezuela by two Spanish shareholders of grain production companies in the South American country. (National Law Journal)

Lawyers, Law Firms

• Ropes & Gray said it is spinning off its wealth management business and related legal practice. (RopesGray.com)
• Montgomery McCracken, a 94-lawyer Philadelphia-based firm, elected litigation partner Ashley R. Lynam, a former city prosecutor, to be co-chair. Lynam will be the first woman to hold that role in the firm’s 111-year history. (MMWR.com)
• A coalition of state attorneys general is urging the US Supreme Court to preserve the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. (New York Law Journal)

Laterals, Moves, In-house

• Sullivan & Worcester landed former Womble Bond Dickinson permitting, land-use and environmental attorney Greg Sampson as partner in Boston on its commercial real estate development team. He was earlier a Brown Rudnick partner and spent 11 years as senior environmental planner at consulting firm BSC Group, Inc. (SullivanLaw.com)
• Kilpatrick Townsend brought in veteran Big Law corporate and investment funds attorney Steven Huttler as partner in New York on its investment management and broker-dealer team. He arrives from Sadis & Goldberg where he was partner. (KilpatrickTownsend.com)
• Perkins Coie snagged Alston & Bird debt finance attorney Jonathan Forgang as partner in Los Angeles in its M&A practice, advising private equity firms and their portfolio companies. (PerkinsCoie.com)
• Honigman LLP said litigator Robert Palmersheim has returned to the firm as partner in Chicago after close to five years running his own firm. (Honigman.com)
• Seward & Kissel said former Hogan Lovells employment litigator David Baron joined the firm as partner in New York. (SewKis.com)
• Legal tech and services company LegalSifter hired veteran Big Law patent litigator Suzanne Porter as general counsel. She’s been in-house at LexisNexis and arrives from the Arizona Supreme Court, where she was legal services innovations officer. (LegalSifter.com)
• Coworking and office space company Workbox added former Sidley Austin corporate and securities attorney Kristen Benson as its first-ever executive vice president, general counsel, based in Chicago. She arrives from Care Capital Properties, Inc. a publicly traded healthcare real estate investment trust, where she was EVP, general counsel and corporate secretary. (Workboxcompany.com)
• CIBO Technologies, a Minneapolis-based agriculture technology software company, hired in-house veteran Kim Stephan as general counsel. She was earlier top lawyer at Virgin Pulse, a health technology company. (CIBOTechnologies.com)

Technology

• LinkSquares released LinkSquares Cloud, an enterprise legal management platform. (Businesswire)

Legal Education

• The law school admissions rate increased in 2022 for the first time in seven years, according to a report. (Law.com)
• North Carolina Central University School of Law, an historically Black school, is set to welcome retired North Carolina Supreme Court associate justice Patricia Timmons-Goodson as its dean. (Law.com)