Top row (L-R): Scott Chambers, Richard Oparil and Robert Durkin; bottom row (L-R): Caroline Maxwell, Carolina Wirth and Kevin Bell, of Arnall Golden Gregory.

A group departure is emptying out Porzio, Bromberg & Newman's Washington, D.C., office, just five years after the firm opened its doors there.

Seven intellectual property and FDA attorneys, including six from Porzio's D.C. office, landed at Arnall Golden Gregory this month. The group is led by partners Kevin Bell, Scott Chambers and Richard Oparil—the same attorneys who helped open Porzio's Washington office in 2014 after arriving from Squire Patton Boggs.

The future of Porzio's Washington office remains uncertain. The website of the Morristown-founded 90-attorney firm shows no lawyer based full time in D.C. now. A Porzio representative did not respond to requests for comment.

In an interview, Bell said he expected nearly all clients of the lateral group would make the transition to Atlanta-based Arnall Golden. He said his team considered more than 50 law firms during a year of recruiting, and that the search was based on his desire to move his practice to a firm with more depth and breadth across multiple practice areas.

Besides Bell, Chambers and Oparil, the lawyers joining Arnall Golden this month also include Dell Chism, Caroline Maxwell and Carolina Wirth. Meanwhile, Bob Durkin, acting director and deputy director of the Office of Dietary Supplement Programs (ODSP) in the FDA's Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, joined Oct. 15.

With the move, the partners are moving back to an Am Law 200 firm. Arnall Golden, ranking No. 192 in the Am Law 200 with $106 million last year in revenue, has about 165 attorneys with two offices, in Atlanta and Washington, D.C.

The seven-attorney team focuses on patent, trademark, copyright and regulatory matters in the life science space. Bell arrived as practice lead of the group and partner; Oparil and Chambers joined as partners; and Durkin, Chism, Maxwell and Wirth join the firm as counsel.

Bell said the group had been established for about 13 years. It began with a core group of attorneys—Bell, along with Oparil and Chambers—who worked together at Patton Boggs, which merged with Squire Sanders in 2014.

Post-merger, they took a dozen colleagues to launch Porzio's Washington, D.C., office. The National Law Journal previously reported that the office's average revenue per lawyer in 2016 rose to $882,000, a 35% increase from the year before. One of the office's largest clients was Natural Alternatives International Inc., which manufactures nutritional supplements, with several litigation matters, the NLJ said.

Wirth came into the fold when she joined Porzio Bromberg from Kilpatrick Townsend in 2018. The team added Durkin, the FDA veteran, to its ranks when discussing the move to Arnold Golden.

Bell said, in their search of a new firm, they looked for a number of factors. "We only considered ones we knew we'd be good cross-selling to and where our existing client base would benefit," he said. "We were looking for a firm that had a broad set of practice areas as well as good bench depth."

Natural Products Association, a large client, will follow the team to Arnall Golden, Bell said. The team also handles patent litigation in the life sciences, biotech and medical devices industries, in addition to advising some clients on some elements in the cannabis and CBD-oil space.

On the regulatory side, the group helps clients with issues before the Food and Drug Administration, the Federal Trade Commission, the Department of Agriculture, among others.

In a statement, Arnall Golden's managing partner, Jonathan Eady, said the firm is "now well-positioned to provide clients with a wide range of services involving intellectual property and FDA law, including patent litigation, regulatory actions and related federal investigations."