Wake Up Call: Davis Polk, Simpson Advise in A&O Shearman Tie-Up

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

• Simpson Thacher said it’s advising Allen & Overy on the London-based firm’s planned merger with New York-based Shearman & Sterling to create a global law firm with around 3,900 lawyers and $3.4 billion in combined revenues. Davis Polk & Wardwell said it’s advising Shearman.
• Simpson said its team advising A&O includes M&A partners Eric Swedenburg, Anthony Vernace, and Jihyun Chung, executive compensation and employee benefits partner Jeannine McSweeney, tax partner Jonathan Goldstein, and antitrust partner Peter Guryan, among others. (STBLAW.com)
• Davis Polk said its corporate team advising Shearman includes partners William H. Aaronson and Lee Hochbaum, executive compensation partner Jennifer S. Conway, and tax partner Michael Mollerus, among others. (DavisPolk.com)
• Sidley Austin said it’s representing reinsurance firm RenaissanceRe Holdings Ltd. on its agreement with American International Group to acquire AIG’s reinsurance business, Validus Re, for $2.985 billion. AIG said it’s getting advice from Wachtell Lipton and Debevoise & Plimpton. Paul Hastings said it advised Morgan Stanley on financing for the deal, with a team led by global finance partner Morgan Bale.
• Sidley said its team advising RenaissanceRe was led by M&A and private equity partner Karen Dewis and M&A and insurance partner Sean Carney. Debevoise & Plimpton said it represented AIG with a team led by insurance M&A partner Marilyn Lion. Wachtell said its deal team included corporate partners Edward D. Herlihy, David K. Lam, and Mark A. Stagliano. (Businesswire)
• The second hundred biggest law firms in the US, the Am Law 200, beat the top hundred firms, the AM Law 100, on revenue growth, average profits per equity partner, and most other financial metrics in 2022. (American Lawyer)

Lawyers, Law Firms

• Hogan Lovells is the latest Big Law firm in London to hike pay for junior lawyers, raising it by 12% to 120,000 pounds. ($148,641). (Legal Cheek)
• The impasse in President Joe Biden’s talks with Republican House Speaker Kevin McCarthy over the federal debt ceiling is casting a cloud of uncertainty over federal courts. (National Law Journal)
• Madison Square Garden in new court papers accuses the New York State Liquor Authority of “colluding” with attorney the company banned from its venues. (New York Post)
• A ruling in a Connecticut malpractice case provided analysis on when expert testimony is needed. (Connecticut Law Tribune)

Laterals, Moves, In-house

• Bradley Arant Boult Cummings launched an Atlanta office with more than 20 attorneys, including 13 partners, among which eight are from Parker Hudson Rainer & Dobbs, led by the former managing partner of that firm, Wayne Hillis, a securities litigation and arbitration attorney. Partners in the group arriving from Big Law firms include health care partner Sidney Welch, a former office managing partner and founder of Akerman’s Atlanta office, commercial real estate and corporate partner Laura Hester, arriving from Womble Bond Dickinson, and Barnes & Thornburg corporate and securities partner Stephen Opler. Bradley also hired six litigators for its Houston office. (Bradley.com)
• E-discovery and information law firm Redgrave LLP snagged Seyfarth Shaw litigation and investigation attorney Kathy Josephson as partner in Chicago. She previously spent 17 years at Katten Muchin Rosenman, including a decade as partner. (RedgraveLLP.com)
• Management-side worklaw firm Littler Mendelson picked up litigator Thomas Lucas as senior counsel in Tysons Corner, Virginia. He arrives from Jackson Lewis, where he was principal and former office managing principal of its Norfolk, Virginia office. (Littler.com)

Legal Education

• A firearm industry trade industry association accuses gun control groups of going to university campuses to convince law students to pledge to never represent the firearm industry, or its interests, in court. (NSSF.org)