Atlanta-based Alston & Bird has continued its West Coast expansion by grabbing four of DLA Piper's lawyers, including two partners, to join the firm's commercial litigation group in Los Angeles.

Jeffrey Rosenfeld, who helped DLA Piper found its Los Angeles office in 2001, has served as the global legal giant's local managing partner, head of the office's litigation practice and chair of its lateral partner hiring program. He is joining Alston & Bird with partner Grant Alexander, counsel Rachel Lowe and senior associate Sean Crain.

“Alston & Bird has a superior reputation in the complex commercial litigation area,” Rosenfeld said. “It was a perfect place for us to go and continue to expand what we do.”

The team's arrival is part of a continuation of Alston & Bird's expansion of its West Coast litigation group. A year ago this month, the firm set up shop in San Francisco after adding seven litigators, including partners Michael Agoglia and Robert “Bo” Phillips Jr., from Reed Smith and Morrison & Foerster. Earlier this year, Alston & Bird added two more lawyers in Los Angeles, an outpost the firm opened a decade ago after absorbing local shop Weston Benshoof Rochefort Rubalcava & MacCuish.

Alston & Bird currently has 109 lawyers in the Golden State, according to numbers provided by the firm, including 80 lawyers in Los Angeles, 37 of them partners. Alston & Bird has six more partners working out of San Francisco and seven partners in Silicon Valley. Alston & Bird opened its office in East Palo Alto, California, a decade ago after adding an 11-lawyer intellectual property team from Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld.

“Maybe the most important thing is the culture of the firm, what a great place to work, the people,” Rosenfeld said about Alston & Bird. “We are overwhelmed with everybody we have met.”

Alexander echoed that sentiment by Rosenfeld, noting that he and his team are excited to help the firm grow in the Southern California market.

“We are wholly committed to growing our Los Angeles office and deepening high-performing practices to meet the growing demand of current and new clients,” said a statement from Alston & Bird Los Angeles partner-in-charge Thomas Wingard. “Jeff and his team bring additional litigation firepower to our clients and add to our bench strength of leading litigators both in Los Angeles and in our other offices in San Francisco and in Silicon Valley.”

The 812-lawyer firm, whose roots are in Atlanta, recently reported a 7 percent increase in gross revenue in 2017, to nearly $781.8 million, while profits per equity partner climbed 6.3 percent last year, to just shy of $2 million. Last week the firm brought on a five-lawyer finance team from Andrews Kurth Kenyon in New York, roughly a month after it added two more partners in Atlanta and Dallas from Dentons and McDermott Will & Emery, respectively. Latham & Watkins did raid Alston & Bird in late February for Jamie Underwood, a former chief of the firm's International Trade Commission litigation practice.

DLA Piper, which recently lost one of its top billing partners in former Americas co-managing partner Michael Poulos, has also been busy on the lateral partner recruitment front in 2018, particularly in Los Angeles.

The Recorder reported a month ago on DLA Piper's addition of Holland & Knight former Los Angeles managing partner Joel Athey and ex-Mitchell Silberberg & Knupp corporate head Kevin Friedmann. DLA Piper's Los Angeles office got a major boost last year after the firm acquired 60-lawyer local boutique Liner.

“L.A. has been a heavy litigation-driven marketplace [and] there is a lot of opportunity for litigation, especially for complex commercial litigation like what we do,” Rosenfeld said. “That kind of opportunity to do high-end, high-quality litigation has continued in the L.A. market.”