Growth Spurs Sheppard Mullin Move Into Century City
Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton LLP has opened a Century City office to enhance the Firm's ability to serve its Los Angeles clients. The new full-service location at 1901 Avenue of the Stars will be home to 35 lawyers initially, with room for further growth and expansion.
"We have experienced a demand for an increased Westside presence over the past year, and the new location demonstrates the firm's long-term commitment to this part of Los Angeles," said Jon Newby, managing partner of the Century City office. "The Century City office will allow us to better serve many clients in the surrounding communities and business centers."
Guy Halgren, managing partner of the firm, commented, "We are exceptionally pleased by the recent growth of the firm, a flourishing Southern California economy and a growing client base. For these reasons, expansion through a new office makes sense at this time. In addition to our downtown office, the Century City location will be a resource for clients to access our depth and breadth of experience in Los Angeles."
The new office was established in part to accommodate the expanding Entertainment & Media Group that Sheppard Mullin has been carefully building over the past year and a half, and solidifies the firm's move to create the dominant entertainment and media practice on the West Coast. Sheppard Mullin established its Entertainment & Media Group in early 2003 with key acquisitions from the highly regarded former Hill Wynne Troop & Meisinger firm, including founders Bob Wynne, Dick Troop and Lou Meisinger, who now serve as senior advisers at the firm. The Entertainment & Media Group is co-chaired by Marty Katz (litigation) and Bob Darwell (transactional).
"Many firms have dabbled in the entertainment industry, with limited success," Katz said. "But Sheppard Mullin made a bold, long-term move into that space by starting with a solid nucleus of experienced entertainment lawyers, and widespread contacts throughout the industry," Katz added. "This approach has permitted us to expand the multi-disciplinary group to include over thirty lawyers whose primary focus is servicing entertainment and advertising industry clients," said Darwell.
"Sheppard Mullin has long been known for the superb quality of its lawyering in many diverse practice areas. The lure of the Entertainment & Media Group, and now the opening of the Century City office, has quickly made us one of the most sought after firms at top law schools across the country, as well as in the lateral market," noted Halgren. In addition to servicing entertainment and advertising industry clients, the attorneys in the Century City office serve the community's diverse business and commercial base in the areas of intellectual property, litigation, antitrust, corporate securities and finance.
Sheppard Mullin is a national law firm with more than 400 attorneys and eight offices in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Orange County, San Diego, Santa Barbara, Century City, Del Mar Heights, and Washington, D.C. The full-service firm provides legal expertise and counsel for U.S. and international clients in a wide range of practice areas, including Corporate; Entertainment and Media; Finance; Government Contracts; Intellectual Property; Labor and Employment; Litigation; Real Estate/Land Use; and Tax, Trusts and Estate Planning. The firm was founded in 1927.