Clifford Chance (CC) has put the final nail in the coffin of its West Coast practice with the highly-symbolic decision to ditch its last
Silicon Valley outpost.
The firm’s sole West Coast partner, Daniel Harris, who heads up the firm’s global intellectual property (IP) practice, will now move to CC’s Washington DC office, which acts as the hub of the firm’s US-based IP practice.
The move follows a review of the firm’s US practice.
The Silicon Valley office will officially shut in May, although the firm has not ruled out a return to the region in the future.
At its peak, CC’s West Coast practice boasted offices in San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego and Palo Alto — the result of a 17-partner raid on Brobeck Phleger & Harrison in 2002 — but in 2004 CC axed all the offices except Palo Alto.
CC regional managing partners for the Americas, Craig Medwick, said that while the firm was open-minded about opening in other states in the future, the short-term strategy was to invest in its Washington and New York offices.
In 2006, the firm continued to build its East Coast practice, hiring a number of partners. CC, which now has more than 300 lawyers in New York, also bagged its biggest US M&A mandate to date in 2006, advising American Power Conversion, on its acquisition by Schneider Electric for $6.1bn (£3.2bn).
Medwick added: “Clients told us a strong New York and Washington presence was critical and that we should be making the investment on the East Coast.”
