Daniel Keating has left Hogan Lovells after two decades to join Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati in Washington, D.C.

Until Aug. 24, Keating was a partner in Hogan Lovells' corporate and M&A groups. He started work at Wilson Sonsini on Monday as a partner in its corporate practice and as a member of the global generic pharmaceutical industry group. Keating said, “it's not clear” whether any others from Hogan Lovells will follow his lead to Wilson Sonsini.

Keating said he found Wilson Sonsini's reputation in the life sciences space particularly attractive and he is excited to work with a greater focus on the generic drug industry than he had at Hogan Lovells.

Daniel Keating.

“Wilson Sonsini has an incredibly strong reputation in [the] technology and life sciences sectors and maybe an unparalleled reputation on the West Coast with respect to that, and an increasing focus on the East Coast,” Keating said.

Keating focuses primarily on fintech, life sciences and technology transactions. His practice will involve corporate and securities matters that involve complex transactions and cross-border M&A deals. He declined to identify any specific clients that might move with him to Wilson Sonsini.

His clients have traditionally been focused on the technology and life sciences sectors. He advised financial services software provider S1 Corp. in 2011 on its roughly $700 million merger with Israel's Fundtech Ltd.

Douglas Clark, managing partner at Wilson Sonsini, said in a statement that Keating's hire will complement its existing work on domestic and international transactions.

“With Dan joining us in Washington, we continue to expand our East Coast corporate practice and strengthen our relationships with key clients, especially those in the global generics and financial industries,” Clark said in prepared remarks.

Wilson Sonsini's hire of Keating comes a little more than a year after the firm's East Coast corporate bench was raided by rival Cooley in New York and the nation's capital. Wilson Sonsini, which reshuffled its leadership structure in late 2017, has had a busy summer.

The firm has brought back a handful of former lawyers with technology and emerging companies expertise on the West Coast and opened an office in London in an effort to tap into the U.K.'s technology and life sciences markets. In June, Wilson Sonsini also hired former Squire Patton Boggs partner Kenji Funahashi in Los Angeles and elevated associate David Yi Wang to a new strategic innovation role. The following month, Wilson Sonsini welcomed back James Jensen, most recently head of Perkins Coie's emerging company and investment fund formation practice in Silicon Valley, as a partner in Palo Alto, California.