As Pittsburgh continues to enjoy a technology and startup renaissance, the legal market is seeing more demand for private equity lawyers in the region, recruiters said.

“We are constantly being asked for private equity attorneys,” said recruiter Maura McAnney of McAnney, Esposito & Kraybill Associates. “Everyone wants to find lawyers in private equity, but finding them is hard.”

Lori Carpenter of Carpenter Legal Search agreed. She said activity by area banks has driven the growth. And the emergence of more local technology companies and development of the nearby Shell ethane cracker—a petrochemical plant that uses oil and gas to create ethylene, which is used to make plastics—have increased business interest in the area in general.

Pittsburgh is also one of a handful of cities competing to house the new Amazon.com Inc. headquarters. Even if the city doesn't emerge victorious from that contest, Amazon has already announced that it is expanding its existing location in Pittsburgh and adding jobs there.

McAnney pointed to another recent example of economic interest in the area: billionaire Thomas Tull's decision to bring his family and his holding company, Tulco, from Los Angeles to Pittsburgh. One of Tulco's recent investments was $65 million in FIGS, a female-founded medical apparel company.

Tull, a former CEO of Legendary Pictures, has filmed movies in the city, including “The Dark Knight Rises.” A minority owner of the Pittsburgh Steelers who owns a farm in western Pennsylvania, he told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette that he plans to make Pittsburgh the home of Tulco's technology operations, including computer scientists, artificial intelligence and machine learning scientists, which the company uses to help its portfolio companies advance.

Ronald Frank of Blank Rome said many of the deals taking place in the Pittsburgh market are relatively small, in the $5 million to $20 million range. There are also a number of deals involving seed funding for startups taking place, he said.

That's an area where Adam Kelson, who recently joined K&L Gates' emerging growth and venture capital practice, specializes. He said his move in January back to K&L Gates, where he practiced as an associate, from Saul Ewing Arnstein & Lehr was client-driven.

The activity in Pittsburgh is still not comparable to activity in larger cities such as New York, or even Philadelphia, Frank said. But there's no question that private equity practices in Pittsburgh are bigger and busier than they were in the past, he said.

“It used to be the way you financed a young company was to go public. The [private equity] firms have taken that over,” Frank said.

The activity includes a number of out-of-state investment firms entering the market, he noted.

Christopher Carson, CEO of Pittsburgh-based Cohen & Grigsby, said there is “a lot of money that needs to be invested” thanks to success in the capital markets over recent years. His firm represents some of the largest funds operating both within and outside the Pittsburgh region, he said, and has counted private equity among its key practices since the firm was founded in 1981.

“Pittsburgh is a growing, vibrant place with a lot of economic activity, so it's a logical place” to invest that money, Carson said. And the law firms are following.

“There are a lot of firms coming here because they sense the commercial opportunity,” Carson said. And with the lower cost of living in Pittsburgh, compared to larger metropolitan areas, the investment for those firms is manageable.