International Law
Major Canadian Law Firm Grows in NYC
Posted May 15, 2008, 11:19 am CDT
By Martha Neil
As other Canadian law firms grow—or even shrink—their international offices by merging, one "stealth mode" competitor has established a full-fledged New York City office entirely through individual lateral hiring.
Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt's office there has grown from a few Canadian lawyers handling Canadian legal matters to some 30 lawyers, many of them from the U.S., handling a full slate of legal matters, reports the Financial Post. The business law firm has more than 450 attorneys in Toronto, Montreal, Calgary, Ottawa and New York.
"We've been laterally recruiting gradually over the last two to three years and the recruiting accelerated through 2007," says Stephen Sigurdson, a managing partner in Toronto, of the firm's NYC campaign. Osler also takes the same approach to recruiting new lawyers for its offices in Canada, he says: "Our culture is such a strong one we concluded that growing by merger ... wasn't the right tactic for us."
In New York, what Sigurdson calls a "north-bound strategy" has been a primary factor in the office's growth: Osler focuses on building relationships with U.S. law firms and bankers whose clients want to pursue Canadian transactions, seeing the American law firms as colleagues rather than competitors.
New matters are also coming in from Canadian clients interested in doing more business in the U.S. and acquiring American companies, he says.
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