| Turnover: | £187.4m |
| Profit per equity partner: | £332,000 |
| Revenue per Lawyer | £277,000 |
| Total number of lawyers: |
677 |
In 2005 McGuireWoods posted global gross revenue of £187.4 ($341m), down by less than 1 per cent from 2004’s £189m ($344m), but still enough to push the firm five places down The Lawyer Global 100 revenue table to 80th position. Average profit per equity partner remained the same at £332,000 ($605,000), but the firm fell 10 places to 93rd spot in the profit table.
This has been a busy period for Virginia-based McGuireWoods, which has a flourishing litigation practice and which concluded two US mergers in as many months. In January 2006 the firm agreed to a merger with Chicago-based Gordon & Glickson, which boosted McGuireWoods’ Chicago office to around 150 lawyers. This followed a 2003 merger with Ross & Hardies.
The firm also merged with 40-lawyer Los Angeles-based Van Etten Suzumoto & Becket, which is best known for real estate and employment litigation matters and has had a working relationship with McGuireWoods for several years. The merger is seen as a formalisation of that informal arrangement.
International strategy has not been top of the firm’s agenda, although it does have a longstanding Brussels presence.
Notable instructions this year include the firm acting as part of BlackBerry manufacturer Research in Motion’s (RIM) defence team, after NTP sued RIM for patent infringement and threatened to close the BlackBerry network if RIM did not settle.
RIM finally bowed to NTP’s demands, striking a £336.5m $612.5m) licensing deal with the Virginia-based patent holders.
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