Douglas Gibson, chairman of Covington & Burling.

Washington, D.C.-founded Covington & Burling reported revenue growth of 6.3% in 2019, pushing the firm's gross revenue to $1.187 billion and completing a 10-year window under former chairman Timothy Hester in which the firm roughly doubled in size from its $586 million mark in 2010.

Profits per equity partner were up from 2018, increasing by about 4% to $1.8 million per partner despite growth in the equity partner tier. But as Covington added lawyers firmwide, revenue per lawyer went down 2.6% to $1.068 million.

The firm's total lawyer head count went up by 9%, while its equity partner count moved up by 8% to a total of 309 out of 1,112 attorneys. The firm does not have a nonequity tier.

"We don't measure our success by year-over-year financial performance," said Douglas Gibson, Covington's newly elected chair, and Hester's successor. "We had a strong year and are on the right path, but we look longer-term as part of our strategy."

Gibson said the majority of practice areas outperformed internal expectations, and that no one or two practice areas floated the firm in 2019. It was a solid collective performance that allowed the firm to continue its growth, he said.

"No single client or matter did that," Gibson said. "We really did enjoy success across all of our practice areas. And we had some longer-term investments come to fruition."

While several practice areas contributed to the firm's 12.1% increase in net income, Gibson highlighted activity in a couple of areas. He said the firm's corporate practice worked on over 270 transactions over the course of the year worth about $260 billion. He said around 100 of those were M&A deals.

"Because of our broad and deep regulatory and policy practices, we are able to provide corporate and M&A services better," Gibson said.

The firm represented Tokyo-based Astellas Pharma in its purchase of U.S.-based Audentes Therapeutics for $3 billion; worked with Merck in its acquisition of cancer-therapy company ArQule for $2.7 billion; and provided services to the Sherman family as it purchased MLB's Kansas City Royals for about $1 billion.

Gibson also highlighted Covington's "critical mass" in its white-collar and litigation practices, saying the firm is set to continue the type of work that earned it recognition as The American Lawyer's Products Liability Litigation Department of the Year in 2019.

That team has defended McKesson in its ongoing legal battles around opioids, which have led to a $260 million settlement in Ohio. The team also is representing Eli Lilly in its Cialis litigation and Monsanto in over 12,000 lawsuits related to its Roundup weed killer, cases that figure to contribute to the firm's bottom line in 2020, he said.

Gibson added that the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States and regulatory practices were going strong, highlighting work the firm has done for clients looking to navigate the U.S./China trade war and understand data privacy concerns.

Gibson, who took his new post in January, said there was little change in the firm's C-suite and other high-ranking, non-attorney positions. Though he did highlight that the firm brought in Kimberly Breier as a special adviser. Breier was formerly the assistant secretary in the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs at the U.S. Department of State.

On the lateral front, Gibson said Covington brought in 15 partner hires through the course of the year, including Amanda Kramer in New York. Kramer was an assistant U.S. attorney in the Southern District of New York for 11 years before joining Covington.

Gibson said the firm is not overly interested in merger discussions. "We had a period of incredible growth over the last decade. We can succeed independently and don't have to merge," Gibson said.

He said there is always the possibility of Covington onboarding a smaller firm, but even that is unlikely as most of the firm's practice areas are at a critical mass, and geographic expansion is not on its agenda in 2020.

Gibson, like many other firm leaders, said a potential economic downturn, which has been on everyone's mind over the last year, is still a cause for concern. But, he noted, the firm plays a long game and it is built to weather such storms.

"We make decisions for the long term," he said, using the past as evidence. "If you look at 2009 during the downturn, we didn't lay off any attorneys or tell summer associates not to come in."

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