- Chairman: R Bruce McLean
- Number of lawyers: : 850
- International Offices: The firm has offices in Beijing, Hong Kong, London, Moscow, Abu Dhabi and Geneva.
Firm Overview:
Recognized for its sophisticated clients and capabilities as well as its outstanding team of professionals, Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld is one of the world’s largest law firms, with 17 offices and over 850 lawyers in more than 50 practice disciplines. Akin Gump’s steadfast dedication to providing exemplary client service and its visionary leadership are key factors in this first-generation law firm’s swift rise to the top of the profession.
Main Areas of Practice:
Corporate & Securities:
Akin Gump advises on mergers and acquisitions, corporate finance and securities, international transactions, investment fund management, private equity and corporate restructuring, providing counsel on US and international tax and governance issues.
Energy:
The firm is a leading advisor to energy companies and provides a full range of legal services, including corporate transactions, project finance and development, and advocacy. Energy clients include public and private companies, financial institutions, private equity firms and sovereign states working across the energy value chain from independent exploration and production activity to renewable energy investment. Key practice strengths include knowledge of global and domestic energy markets, broad and deep transactional experience, as well as attention to strategic considerations.
Financial Restructuring:
Akin Gump has represented committees of bondholders, noteholders, institutional investors and trade creditors in more than 250 major restructurings since 1999. Among its most significant recent engagements are the representations of the official creditors’ committees in the Delta Air Lines, Calpine Corporation, World Com, Inc. and Washington Mutual, Inc. bankruptcies.
Global Project Finance:
Recognized for its project finance and implementation work, the firm has significant experience representing lenders, developers, suppliers, underwriters and sovereign states in project finance and implementation projects to meet some of the world’s most complex infrastructure needs in the areas of construction, including airports and highways, energy, mining, shipping and maritime, as well as water and sanitation.
Intellectual Property:
The firm provides counsel on patent litigation, trademark, copyright, trade secret and unfair competition matters to Fortune 500 companies, multinational corporations and entertainment conglomerates, as well as small businesses, universities, research foundations, government agencies and individual inventors.
Investment Funds Private Equity:
Akin Gump provides comprehensive representation - frominitial organization and funding, through managing extraordinary growth – for many of the largest and most prominent funds in the world, including both hedge funds and private equity funds. Helping to build leading private equity franchises from the ground up is a hallmark of the practice. The group advises on all aspects and phases of private equity business – from structuring and organizing a private equity firm and all of the funds it sponsors, to assisting in the evaluation of investment opportunities, to structuring and completing investments and structuring and implementing exit strategies.
International Trade:
The firm’s lawyers, economists, and other professionals provide representation in the areas of anti-dumping and countervailing duty litigation, customs laws, export controls and economic sanctions, antiboycott laws, WTO dispute resolution proceedings, and other trade proceedings and trade policy.
Labor & Employment:
The firm provides advice and representation to employers regarding all aspects of employment law and labor relations, handling major class action wage-hour and EEO litigation, as well as traditional matters such as collective bargaining and discrimination suits. The group’s lawyers advise on the labor aspects of major corporate reorganizations and acquisitions, help restructure labor contracts in bankruptcy, design and implement employee health and welfare benefit plans, and for those employers with facilities in Europe, assist with complying with the social legislation of the European Union.
Litigation:
With more than 300 lawyers, Akin Gump’s Litigation Group includes attorneys who have served as clerks at every level of the federal and state court systems; members of the American Academy of Appellate Lawyers; former prosecutors; and former officials at the SEC, FTC, DOJ and many other federal agencies. Akin Gump’s litigators are accustomed to handling matters of exceptional complexity, such as nationwide class actions, parallel civil and administrative proceedings, and nationwide and multidistrict litigation.
Public Law & Policy:
Akin Gump has one of the world’s most sophisticated and diverse US and international public law and policy practices, representing corporations, individuals, nonprofits, foreign governments, and coalitions and trade associations.