Photo: Diego M. Radzinschi/ALM

Two commercial litigation partners at Crowell & Moring, including a former management board member, have left to join the partnership at Perkins Coie.

Citing their attraction to Perkins Coie's growth strategies and the firm's practices, Edwin Baum and Alan Howard joined the New York office of Seattle-based Perkins Coie on Wednesday.

The moves come more than a year after Washington, D.C.-based Crowell and New York-based Herrick Feinstein called off merger talks. Crowell had also had unsuccessful merger talks with Satterlee Stephens in New York.

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Baum led Crowell's litigation practice in New York, and he was previously managing partner of the firm's New York office and a member of the firmwide management board for three years. Howard and Baum joined Crowell together in 2012, after Baum arrived from Proskauer Rose and Howard joined from now-defunct Dewey & LeBoeuf.

Herrick has also seen some partners leave after the Crowell-Herrick talks ended, including a former executive committee member who cited differing views over firm strategy.

But Baum and Howard said the Crowell-Herrick merger talks or the collapse of those talks were not a factor in their decision to leave. “It wasn't a matter of having a difference of opinion in strategic direction,” Howard said, adding, “we had faith in the current leadership of Crowell.”

Philip Inglima was named Crowell's management board chair after the sudden exit last year of Angela Styles, now a partner at Bracewell.

Howard and Baum pointed to practice and client sector strengths at Perkins Coie as factors in their move. “Crowell generally is a D.C.-centered firm with its core strength in government-facing practices,” Howard said, while Perkins represents public and emerging companies with transactions and litigation “that are more suited to the practices we have.”

Baum added that Perkins Coie has “strong relationships with significant public companies throughout the country and provides an ideal platform to continue to grow my practice and my business.”

“We have great admiration and respect for our former colleagues,” Baum added.

While they declined to discuss Crowell's business in New York, they said they were attracted to their new firm's growth plans in New York and Its “excellent track record” of growing offices outside its home base in Seattle. “It was the vision,” Howard said, “to be a part of the foundation of the growth” of the New York office and “the credibility” of that vision that attracted them, Howard said.

Perkins Coie's new hires come as the firm is about to move to larger space next year at 1155 Avenue of the Americas. The firm has about 50 lawyers in New York, but Baum and Howard's addition represents some of the first additions in commercial litigation.

While they met more than six years ago when they joined Crowell, they said “staying together was crucial” when they saw an opportunity to join Perkins Coie.

Baum focuses on disputes arising from transactions, as well as securities and financial services litigation and representing companies in pharmaceutical, financial services, automotive, transportation and industrial products sectors. Howard, a former chair of the board of directors of the Southern Poverty Law Center, focuses on commercial contract disputes, cross-border litigation and international mediations, representing those in transportation, manufacturing and telecommunications. He also serves as counsel to fintech companies.

They said they anticipate certain clients will continue with them at Perkins Coie, while they anticipate they will continue working with Crowell as co-counsel on some client matters.

Glen McGorty, who is now managing partner of Crowell & Moring's New York office, said in a statement that “growing our New York office is a top priority for our firm, and we are excited to continue to build our litigation, regulatory and transactional talent here.”

His statement noted Crowell's 2017 hiring of Rebecca Ricigliano, formerly first assistant attorney general of New Jersey, and Juan Arteaga, a former deputy assistant attorney general at the Justice Department.

More recently, Crowell's New York office in January added Brian Gearing, an IP attorney who arrived from Kirkland & Ellis. “We are actively recruiting and have exciting new things on our horizon,” McGorty's statement said.