Hogan Lovells roared back in 2023 with record global revenue and equity partner profits.
The firm reached $2.68 billion in gross revenue, a 10.3% increase, the firm reported. Profits per equity partner shot up by 20% to $2.7 million.
Hogan said its revenue-per-lawyer metric also hit its highest-ever mark as it reached just over $1 million. Hogan has just shy of 2,500 lawyers, as disclosed by the firm in the 2023 American Lawyer survey, in 48 offices around the world.
It’s the product of a 2010 combination of U.S.-based firm Hogan & Hartson and European-based Lovells.
Hogan rebounded after a 2022 in which the international firm mirrored many others in the Big Law market that suffered uncharacteristic drops in both metrics.
Miguel Zaldivar
Photo: Hogan Lovells
CEO Miguel Zaldivar, in an interview with Bloomberg Law, attributed the rise in part to a record year for the firm’s mergers and acquisitions and related practices, including through its assistance with the $12.7 billion merger between self-storage giants Extra Space Storage Inc. and Life Storage Inc., as well as Mercedes Benz Group AG in its joint venture to build electric vehicle chargers.
Hogan also advised Marsh McLennan on the sale of Mercer’s US health administration business and UK pensions administration business to Bain Capital Insurance in 2023, as well as Harbour Energy in its $11.2 billion acquisition of Wintershall Dea assets.
“I can tell you quite honestly, it’s remarkable,” said Zaldivar of last year’s growth, which pushed the firm closer toward his stated, but still unobtained, goal of joining the small, elite club of $3 billion per year law firms. As of 2022, just five firms had broached the number: Kirkland & Ellis, Latham & Watkins, DLA Piper, Baker McKenzie, and Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom.
Zaldivar, elected to a second four-year term as the transatlantic firm’s leader last September, has been working toward boosting the firm’s brand as a top-tier, “global elite” firm, and said the firm’s growth is proof that the strategy is working.
The market knows us as a firm that handles “complex work in highly regulated sectors” and markets, including Washington and London, he said.
The firm noted in a written statement that about half of its work last year, 48% was billed in the Americas, and that the firm’s Europe, Middle East and African regions brought in 47%, with the rest of the work coming out of the Asia-Pacific region.
Top Hires
The firm added more than 50 partners globally last year, according to the statement, which included the partners who were members of the roughly 70-lawyer team that jumped to Hogan’s New York, Miami, DC, and LA offices from the failing Stroock & Stroock & Lavan last October and November.
Some of the firm’s top hires last year included Jeff Keitelman in New York, who had co-chaired Stroock’s real estate team and now co-chairs Hogan’s US real estate practice and former DC attorney general Karl Racine, who is also a former Venable managing partner, who helped launch Hogan’s state attorneys general practice.
The firm also reappointed Paris IP litigation partner Marie-Aimée de Dampierre as chair for a second three-year term, beginning next May.
The firm has continued its lateral hiring streak in early 2024, including a team of 23 finance and M&A lawyers from Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe announced Monday, who are heading into the firm’s Milan and Rome offices.
Zaldivar, who recently noted the importance of the firm’s New York office to its overall success, said that while adding the bulk of the Stroock team was strong value-add for the firm, he’s planning to continue to grow the office in the coming year.
Hogan’s efforts to grow its M&A practice in New York and Europe have helped the firm overcome challenging market conditions, and to grow it into the largest practice area in the firm, he said.
Zaldivar said he’s planning investments in several additional key markets for the firm in the coming months, such as Washington, London, California, and Texas.
Hogan isn’t the only top-25 firm by revenue to report significant jumps from 2022 to 2023. Paul Hastings leaders say their revenue boomed by about 9% to over $1.8 billion.