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Winston & Strawn Receives Pro Bono Award from ABA

The American Bar Association has conferred the 2006 "Ann Liechty Pro Bono Award" to Winston & Strawn LLP for the firm's volunteer work. Winston & Strawn is the first law firm to be honored with this special award, given for outstanding pro bono legal services to children in custody cases. In the past, it has been awarded to individual attorneys for their pro bono work. Each year, the award recognizes a lawyer or law firm who has enhanced the lives of children by improving or delivering volunteer legal services to children involved in private child custody proceedings.

Winston & Strawn formed a partnership with the Chicago Volunteer Legal Services Foundation, awarded the ABA child custody grant to help initiate the pro bono program. In the 1990s, CVLS was appointed as guardian ad litem in problematic guardianship cases, but by early 2002, the growing number of appointments exceeded the resources of CVLS. The partnership formed later that year with Winston & Strawn benefited both parties, providing the firm with a continuing pro bono opportunity.

Winston & Strawn was one of the first large law firms in the country to adopt a written pro bono policy in 1991, to become a signatory to the ABA Pro Bono Challenge and to establish a well-funded charitable foundation. Winston & Strawn LLP is an international law firm with 900 attorneys across nine offices in Chicago, Geneva, London, Los Angeles, Moscow, New York, Paris, San Francisco, and Washington, DC.

08-30-2006

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Jackson Lewis Opens Office in Oregon

Jackson Lewis is flexing its muscles in Oregon, having recently opened a new office in Portland. The firm is eager to enter the highly competitive legal market of Oregon, dominated by law firm heavyweights Stoel Rives; Barran Liebman; Markowitz, Herbold, Glade & Mehlhaf; and Ball Janik. The addition of Jackson Lewis in the list of law firms present in Portland will heat up the competition between national and local law firms eager to grab a major market share in the state.

Jackson Lewis believes that the region offers opportunities for growth with the presence of major financial institutions and corporate offices. The firm has already handled a number of jury trials and labor campaigns in Portland and services several major clients in the area out of its Seattle and San Francisco offices. The firm is anticipating a rise in union activities in the region, primarily due to the creation of unions affiliated with the Change to Win group. The group has allotted millions of dollars towards organizing campaigns throughout the Pacific Northwest. Jackson Lewis attorneys specialize in representing management exclusively in workplace law focusing on employment, labor, immigration, and benefits law and related litigation. In Portland, Jackson Lewis intends to focus on devising innovative and successful strategies to educate employees about the realities of a unionized workplace.

08-30-2006

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Law firms increase IT infrastructure services to focus on performance and efficiency

With the advent of new technologies over recent decades, law firms have experienced tremendous growth in information both created and received. A corresponding need has arisen for fast data access and retrieval throughout the law firm business. In the interests of maximum efficiency, therefore, firms are searching for a solution capable of growing and evolving with their needs.

The current IT solutions meet these expectations with centralized management control, data recovery solutions, and making data storage more robust and flexible. Law firms, with their increased demand for data management tasks due to compliance requirements, business growth, and expanding client bases, are increasingly adopting the technological developments.

This prevailing trend generates good business for IT service providers, who are cashing in on the opportunity to offer their services to law firms. Pillar Data Systems has devised a data storage infrastructure for law firm's in-house case management and document management databases, as well as its e-mail archival. Similarly, NaviSite provides IT hosting, outsourcing, and professional services for mid- to large-sized organizations.

Atlanta-based Morris, Schneider & Prior; Minneapolis-based Foley & Mansfield; Salt Lake City-based firm Kirton & McConkie; Washington, DC,-based Howrey LLP; and New Orleans based McGlinchey Stafford are amongst the law firms who have installed and successfully implemented advanced IT tools to enhance the production system without the need to engage technical support.

With the help of such advanced IT tools, law firms across the country have managed to scale up their efficiency standards to help in the smooth working and administration of the firm. The IT technology wave in the legal industry is poised to induce fresh competition between law firms as they vie for a larger market share in the country and across the globe.

08-30-2006

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DLA Piper targeting makeover of brand image, shortens name

In order to strengthen its international brand image, DLA Piper Rudnick Gray Cary, is expected to change to a new, shorter name this September. The firm has consolidated its operations through a series of mergers in past seven years in U.S., Europe, and Asia. DLA Piper is working on its marketing strategy to evolve a unique identity of its own which rests on traditional values.

Lynne Marek of The National Law Journal reports that DLA Piper intends to build on the firms' strengths in five practice areas — litigation, corporate and finance, real estate, government affairs, and intellectual property to attract large corporate clients to generate additional business. In January 2005, London-based DLA merged operations with U.S.-based Piper Rudnick and Gray Cary Ware & Freidenrich, which now has 3,100 lawyers in 22 countries and 59 offices.

08-23-2006

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Lowrie, Lando & Anastasi adds partners for IP practice

Lowrie, Lando and Anastasi have stepped up efforts to strengthen the firm's IP practice by adding five new partners. Kevin M. Littman, Thomas P. McNulty, Mark A. Miller, Thomas J. McGinnis, and Sandra Szela Congdon will be a part of the team that offers expertise in all areas of intellectual property litigation, counseling and transactions, patent and trademark prosecution, counseling, drafting infringement, patentability opinions. The Massachusetts-based law firm has worked extensively in the areas of litigation, electrical and computer software, chemical patent procurement, and counseling, and is now expanding its capability to meet the requirements of clients in the region.

The law firm specializes in intellectual property and related litigation and specializes in providing its client base with the protection they need to grow their business and protect their intellectual property assets.

08-23-2006

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Baker & McKenzie increasing global tax practice

In an attempt to increase their global tax practice, U.S.-based Baker & McKenzie has hired the services of three senior attorneys: one partner, Brendan Kelly, and two tax associates at its Shanghai office. The initiative is expected to boost the firm's presence in the Asia Pacific region, especially China, where the current tax system is under review. The Chinese government is actively considering doing away with the special tax holidays for foreign investors and replacing it with a single tax rate for both foreign-owned and domestic organizations. This development will have a significant impact on the firm's client base in the region.

Baker & McKenzie already has a significant presence in the region, with offices in Hong Kong, Beijing, and Shanghai which offer legal services, with particular emphasis on: Banking and Finance, Capital Markets, China Trade and Investment, Construction, Corporate and Commercial, Dispute Resolution, Employment, Insurance and other financial services, Intellectual Property, Major Projects & Project Finance, Mergers and Acquisitions, Property, Securities, Taxation, Technology, Media and Telecommunications, Venture Capital, and WTO & Trade. The firm's team of more than 550 tax lawyers comprises economists and financial analysts and is considered one of the largest tax practices in the world.

08-23-2006

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Cooley Godward to merge operations with Kronish Lieb

California-based Cooley Godward has finalized plans to merge its operations with New York-based litigation boutique Kronish Lieb Weiner & Hellman, reports the New York Law Journal. The new entity will be called Cooley Godward Kronish, with an overall lawyer strength of 550. It will be operational from October 1 and is aimed at allowing Cooley Godward to establish its presence in New York.

With technology and biotechnology transactional groups, Cooley Godward also brings expertise in litigation and intellectual property whereas Kronish Lieb will add litigation practice, bankruptcy practice, tax, real estate, and white-collar criminal defense practice that will significantly add to the specialization of the new merged firm. The combined firm will have a litigation group of almost 250 lawyers, and intends to target private equity and mergers and acquisition for growth in New York. The 110-lawyer firm Kronish Lieb was looking for a bigger partner to sustain the competition in New York, the center of big law firms.

08-23-2006

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