Photo: Diego M. Radzinschi/ALM

Lincoln "Linc" Finkenberg, a senior corporate trusts lawyer at Bank of New York Mellon, has joined Perkins Coie's New York office, where he will be a partner in its financial transactions practice.

Finkenberg, who will also work with fintech clients, joined Perkins Coie on Friday after having worked for about 14 years at BNY Mellon, most recently serving as associate general counsel and managing director. He said he worked with many outside firms while in-house, and was impressed with Perkins Coie's innovativeness.

"Perkins has a great culture," he said, calling the firm "very entrepreneurial minded, very tech savvy and very open to change."

During his time at BNY Mellon, Finkenberg advised on major financial deals, including, early on, the acquisition of JPMorgan Chase & Co.'s corporate trust business, and more recently, the transition of another bank's government securities clearing business. He eventually came to oversee more than 30 lawyers and 100 transaction managers, according to his new firm, helping to manage risk and oversee broker-dealer and government clearing services.

He and his team also led the creation and purchase of overseas trust banks in Latin America, Europe and Asia.

Outside of the banking business, Finkenberg said he nurtured a knowledge of programming, machine learning and artificial intelligence, which he said can help law firms become more efficient and improve their accuracy, objectivity and client service. There are already software products on the market being deployed in the mergers and acquisitions context that can read tens of thousands of contracts and identify unusual clauses for lawyers to review during the due-diligence process, he said.

Finkenberg said he is also well-versed on risk management, having worked with BNY Mellon during the depths of the financial crisis. BNY Mellon was a major clearing and so-called triparty repo bank, and faced different risks than other banks did.

One person who played a role in Finkenberg's move was Ron Sarubbi, the chairman of Perkins Coie's financial transactions practice, whom Finkenberg said he came to know in his time at BNY Mellon. In a statement, Sarubbi said the new partner would help a broad swathe of the firm's clients, but singled out banks, noting his "wide-ranging global knowledge of trust banks."

Finkenberg earned his law degree from New York University Law School and has a bachelor's degree in accounting and finance from Baruch College.