US NATIONAL firm Greenberg Traurig improved its position in The Global 100 by three places last year, with revenue increasing by 21 per cent, from $712m (£391.2m) to $860.5m (£472.8m).

Three months before the end of its 2006 financial year, the firm was predicting its performance this year would see it break through the $1bn (£549.45m) barrier for the first time.

PEP grew by 10.7 per cent, from $985,000 (£541,000) to $1.09m (£599,000).

Greenberg is unusual in that it is a highly diversified practice, both in terms of its practice area groupings and its US coverage. It has around 30 offices across the US and has achieved its growth without any major mergers

But even without the additional bulk a merger provides, Greenberg has consistently managed a compound growth rate of around 20 per cent between 1985 and 2005.

Internationally its growth strategy appears to be taking a similar ‘no merger’ line. Curiously, the firm’s only European office is in Amsterdam, a move described by the firm’s president Cesar Alvarez as “a flanking manoeuvre”. Whatever the rationale, the firm claims the office has been profitable from day one.

On a larger scale the firm became much better known to the UK market in 2005 when it struck a formal alliance with Olswang. The first deal to close after a referral from Greenberg came in November 2005, when Olswang advised Nine.com on its $57m (£33m) takeover by Leisure & Gaming. Greenberg’s New York head Richard Rosenbaum maintained towards the end of 2006 that the two firms remained independent, but were “extremely close”.

Although Greenberg’s practice is widely spread in all senses, its core departments include real estate, litigation, corporate and IP/media. Its largest office is New York, which launched in 1996 and which now has around 330 lawyers.