Dallas downtown skyline at night, Texas. (Credit: kan_khampanya/Shutterstock.com)Amid COVID-19 Uncertainty, Law Firms Continue Their March Into Texas
After a lull in new office announcements, D.C.'s Ivins, Phillips & Barker landed in Dallas this week with the GC of a former client who used the firm for employment work.
June 02, 2020 at 10:55 AM
3 minute read
Out-of-state law firms are continuing to set up shop in Texas, with Washington, D.C.'s Ivins, Phillips & Barker launching a Dallas office with former Accudyne Industries general counsel Kevin McGlinchey.
Building on his client-side ties with the midsize firm, McGlinchey joined Ivins Phillips on Monday as of counsel, with a focus on employee benefits and executive compensation work.
He said his in-house position wound down in March, after Warburg Pincus purchased the last part of his former company Accudyne, and he was considering what he might do next.
As general counsel, he said, he used Ivins Phillips for many years for pension, 401(k) and health and welfare matters, and when the firm approached him about opening an office in Dallas to help serve its Texas clients, he decided it was a good opportunity.
"They are some of my favorite people in the world," McGlinchey said of the Ivins Phillips lawyers.
Kevin McGlinchey, of counsel with Ivins, Phillips & Barker in Dallas.(Courtesy photo)
Eric Fox, managing partner of Ivins Phillips, could not immediately be reached for comment on the firm's Texas expansion plans. McGlinchey said he sees prospects for growth in Dallas, but the timing is uncertain because "these are sort of unprecedented and uniquely challenging times."
The first quarter of the year saw a flurry of non-Texas firms launching new offices in the state, including Michael Best & Friedrich, Perkins Coie, Baker & Hostetler, Thompson Coburn, Balch & Bingham and Shearman & Sterling.
Those announcements all but stopped as the coronavirus crisis gripped the industry in April and May, but given continued lateral hiring and the state's gradual reopening, activity may now pick up again.
Meanwhile, McGlinchey isn't the only former in-house lawyer in Texas to make a move to a firm Monday. Also in Dallas, former Goldman Sachs vice president and associate general counsel Brian Bolton joined Locke Lord as a partner in the firm's real estate acquisition and finance practice, an area he had focused on at Goldman Sachs.
He represents purchasers, owners and developers in connection with the acquisition, disposition and development of real property, and also lenders and borrowers in lending transactions secured by real and related personal property.
In a press release, Vicky Gunning, managing partner of Locke Lord's Dallas office and co-chair of the firm's finance, banking and real estate department, wrote that Bolton is a "substantial addition" to the practice group.
Bolton was a Locke Lord associate earlier in his career.
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Law Firm Expansion in Texas Continued at Strong Clip in 2019
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