Los Angeles-based Manatt, Phelps & Phillips is the latest national firm to move into the Boston marketplace, announcing Wednesday that it had hired the co-chairman of Holland & Knight's cybersecurity, data breach and privacy team to lead the new office.

Scott Lashway will now co-lead Manatt's own privacy and data security practice alongside Donna Wilson, the firm's CEO and managing partner-elect.

“Boston is home to some of the best-known and longest-established companies that are constantly evolving to meet new challenges,” Wilson said in a statement. “Scott is a natural fit because his practice aligns perfectly with our integrated professional services approach that allows us to counsel both the disruptors and the disrupted.”

Lashway's practice focuses on handling highly sophisticated cybersecurity risks. He helps clients prepare to ward off cyber intrusions, and also handles responses to incidents as well as related litigation. He said that a mutual friend of his and Wilson's reached out about the prospect of joining Manatt.

“The fit was perfect because we already shared some clients,” he said. “Our approach to counseling and the experience we offer was naturally aligned.”

Lashway arrives after the firm has made several other recent hires in the privacy and data security arena, including ex-U.S. Steel general counsel Suzanne Folsom and her colleague Robert Garretson, who works as a managing director on the firm's consulting side. In recent years, under current firm leader Bill Quicksilver, Manatt has emphasized building out its consulting operations in addition to its legal expertise.

Wilson, who joined the firm as a lateral partner in 2013, in July will replace Quicksilver, who has served in both leadership roles since 2007.

Manatt's presence in Boston will not be limited to cybersecurity. The firm blends over 300 lawyers and 100 consultants into a hybrid professional services format. Massachusetts resident Patricia Boozang, a senior managing director and the leader of the firm's health business strategy, policy, and analytics practice, will be joining the new office, after previously being attached to the firm's New York office.

Lashway noted that the firm already has significant clients in Boston, and said it aims to grow the office to support clients in health care, financial services, tech and digital services.

“This is something clients want and we're offering it,” he said of the firm's combination of legal and consulting services.

The firm added in a statement that Boston is one part of a broader strategic growth plan to enhance its capabilities on the East Coast. The firm has existing offices in Albany, New York, and Washington D.C. It also has five offices in California, as well as in Chicago.

Other recent entrants into the Boston market include Arent Fox, which merged with midsize firm Posternak Blankstein & Lund in December; Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, which hired lawyers out of Ropes & Gray's cybersecurity practice in January; and Morrison & Foerster, which took a sizable group from midsize firm Riemer & Braunstein in February.

|

Read More

Boston Forecast Sees More Law Firm Mergers Ahead

|