Merger Is Off Between WolfBlock and Akerman Senterfitt

Law Firms

Merger Is Off Between WolfBlock and Akerman Senterfitt

Posted Sep 4, 2008, 08:01 am CST
By Debra Cassens Weiss

The word last month was that the merger of Philalephia-based Wolf, Block, Schorr & Solis-Cohen and Akerman, Senterfitt & Eidson of Miami was delayed but not ditched while the firms hammered out a conflicts issue.

Apparently the issue became a deal-breaker. Firm leaders have called off a planned merger that would have produced one of the nation’s largest law firms with more than 800 lawyers.

WolfBlock chairman Mark Alderman told the Philadelphia Inquirer that the conflict of interest and the bad economy derailed the deal.

If the deal had been completed, one of the law firms would have had to give up its insurance business, worth more than $10 million to each firm, Alderman said. WolfBlock represents plaintiffs in suits against insurers while Akerman Senterfitt defends insurers. The loss was too high during bad economic times.

"The backstory is the bad economy; that is the context in which we tried to get this done," Alderman told the Inquirer.

Law firm consultant Brad Hildebrandt, who advised both firms, said another problem was WolfBlock’s unfunded pension liabilities, but it was resolved early in the negotiations.

An anonymous source had told the National Law Journal that the unfunded pension liabilities represented one of two financial issues holding up the merger. The second was the amount of taxes WolfBlock would have to pay to merge with a corporation.

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