Duane Morris has hired Robert Kadlec, a longtime partner at Sidley Austin, to bolster a corporate practice it launched in Los Angeles earlier this year after absorbing local boutique Horgan Rosen Beckham & Coren.

Kadlec, a certified public accountant who has worked at Sidley since 1995, advises clients on corporate financing transactions, corporate governance matters and M&A deals.

He said that Duane Morris' addition in January of eight corporate and banking lawyers from Horgan Rosen—five of them partners—had signaled to him that the Philadelphia-based Am Law 100 firm was serious about expanding in Southern California. He noted that Duane Morris, with a location in San Diego, even has one more office in the Golden State than Sidley does.