Richard Hays, with Alston & Bird, in Atlanta. (Photo: John Disney/ALM)

Alston & Bird significantly boosted profits and revenue per lawyer last year, while revenue increased at a more moderate rate.

Alston's chairman, Richard Hays, said the firm exceeded budget. Litigation work was up across the board, he said, and demand increased for significant transactional work in several key, high-value practices, including M&A, banking, finance and private equity.

Health care, payments systems, data security and intellectual property were also busy areas, he said.

The Atlanta-based firm's net income jumped 8.7% to $343.32 million. That pushed up profits per equity partner by 7.9% to $2,251,000, as equity partner head count remained flat (up by a net of two for 153 equity partners). Alston broke the $2 million mark for PEP in 2018.

Relatedly, the firm's profit margin has increased over the past two years from 38% to 41% of revenue.

Revenue increased last year by 2.9% to $835.87 million, which boosted revenue per lawyer over the $1 million mark to $1,050,000—a 5.6% increase. That was coupled with a slight decline in head count, which dipped 2.6% to 796 lawyers.

Hays said he was pleased with the productivity increase, as reflected in RPL. "We devoted a lot of attention to matter management, including efficient staffing," he said, which was "part of an intense focus on getting closer to clients and finding out what their pain points are."

Alston's 2.9% revenue growth last year was at a slower rate than its 3.9% revenue growth in 2018–but the firm's 8.7% increase in net income outpaced its 7% profit growth in 2018.

Over the past decade, since the aftermath of the financial crisis, Alston has increased its net income and its PEP by almost 150% (net income increased from $138.35 million to $343.32 million in 2009, and PEP rose from $910,000 to $2,251,000).

Since 2009, Alston's revenue has increased by 52%, from $551.2 million in 2009 to $835.87 million last year.

The firm ended 2019 with no debt, Hays said, adding that technology continued to be a big expense as the firm invests in data analytics and other tools to help attorneys manage matters more efficiently.

Alston formed a unique, broad-based partnership last year with Georgia State University's 2.5-year-old Legal Analytics Lab to develop artificial intelligence programs for the firm from the ground up. The goal is to help Alston's lawyers and staff better understand existing software applications for legal data and develop new ones that serve firm and client needs—such as managing cases more efficiently and achieving better case results.

On the expense side, Alston opened a seven-lawyer London office in September focused on finance, payments systems and competition (antitrust) law. Post-Brexit, the firm is seeing more demand for its payments systems and antitrust practices, Hays said, "because people are trying to figure out regulatory environments."

The London office—the firm's 12th—connects with its payments practice in its Brussels outpost, led by Rich Willis. The firm opened that office in 2011 to extend its marquee payments practice, which originated in Atlanta—a global payments hub—to Europe.

Hays said Alston has "always been cautious about opening new offices, but we've also always said we'll be where our clients need us to be—and we see opportunities for growth in these areas that we are committed to."

The Talent

While Alston added a net of two equity partners in 2019, it reported a 1.6% decline in total partner head count, for 363 partners. Lateral recruitment and internal promotions continued apace, Hays said, but an unusually high number of retirements flattened partner head count.

The firm added 14 lateral partners last year and promoted another 16 lawyers to partner, but Hays said 16 partners retired in 2019, which is about three times the usual rate. "That's not in the pipeline for the coming year," he said.

Alston grew head count materially in key practices for the firm, Hays added, such as banking and finance, payments systems and health care.

In London, Alston recruited partners Andrew Petersen and James Spencer, who have a structured finance practice, plus two associates from K&L Gates, where Petersen headed that firm's London finance practice.

Alston hired another partner, James Ashe-Taylor, with a competition and payments system practice, and two associates from Constantine Cannon, where Ashe-Taylor headed that firm's European antitrust practice. Ashe-Taylor formerly headed Gibson Dunn's London and Brussels offices.

On the international front, the firm also hired a data privacy partner in Brussels, Wim Nauwelaerts from Sidley Austin.

Alston continued to invest in its West Coast offices. The firm added environmental litigation partner Greg Christianson from Morgan Lewis to its three-year-old San Francisco office in June, and then in January antitrust litigator Stuart Plunkett, president of the San Francisco Bar Association, from Baker Botts. In Los Angeles, the firm added corporate partner Scott Adamson, who'd headed Vedder Price's Los Angeles office, and IP litigator Yuri Mikulka from Manatt, Phelps & Phillips.

In Washington, Alston added five new partners last year, including Kathleen Benway, a former chief of staff for the Federal Trade Commission's Consumer Protection Bureau, from Wilkinson Barker Knauer.

The firm added white-collar litigation partner Tery Gonsalves to its Atlanta headquarters last year and then another white-collar litigator, Joey Burby, from Bryan Cave in February.

Among departures, in Alston's Atlanta headquarters it lost a trio of product liability defense litigators who started an Atlanta office for Shook Hardy & Bacon in June: Colin Kelly, Josh Becker and Anna Sumner Pieschel.

The Work

Alston ranked No. 19 on Mergermarket's 2019 list of law firms advising on U.S. M&A deals, with 82 deals valued at $182.1 billion. The firm advised longtime client FleetCor Technologies in its acquisition of Nvoicepay, which supplies accounts-payable technology, for an undisclosed price after handling earlier acquisitions for FleetCor including its 2017 acquisition of CambridgeGlobal Payments for $690 million.

It also advised Mobius Imaging and subsidiary Cardan Robotics in their $500 million acquisition by medical device company Stryker.

Alston acted as counsel to Credit Suisse, Citi and other investment banks on 23 transactions with an aggregate value of $153 billion—including as counsel to Credit Suisse on its representation of payments processor Worldpay in its $43 billion acquisition by fintech firm Fidelity National Information Services—one of the largest-ever fintech and payments deals.

Alston advised lenders or a number of major loan deals, ranking as No. 9 as underwriter counsel for 19 offerings worth $4.6 billion and No. 13 as issuer counsel with nine offerings valued at $2 billion, according to Asset-Backed Alert.