Ropes & Gray, which has long been building out its San Francisco and Silicon Valley offices, has elevated San Francisco partner Greg Davis a co-managing partner for those locations.

Davis will replace former co-managing partner Rick Gallagher in San Francisco. While, Raj Marphatia, who is based primarily in Palo Alto, will also continue as a co-managing partner for the firm's West Coast presence.

“Although Ropes & Gray has an integrated offering in terms of our West Coast services, we've always had a partner from each of the Bay Area offices acting as co-leaders,” Davis said. “This underscores Ropes & Gray's broader collaborative approach. Raj and I have worked together for nearly two decades.”

He added, “as co-office managing partners, we'll continue to expand and deepen our regional offerings, ensuring that clients—whether in the Bay Area or around the globe—continue to receive the best-in-class service that Ropes & Gray is known for.”

Ropes & Gray originally set down roots in San Francisco in 1992 to service a West Coast clientele that included Stanford University. In 2004, it acquired intellectual property law firm Fish & Neave, adding another office in Palo Alto. Over time, the head count for the two offices has reached triple digits.

“With over 110 lawyers across our two Bay Area offices, there's considerable momentum as we continue to expand our client offerings on the West Coast,” Marphatia said in a statement. “Greg is a natural leader and I am excited to have him join me as co-managing partner.”

Davis, who has practiced in Ropes & Gray's San Francisco office for over 16 years, was raised in Northern California. He has over 25 years of experience representing the investment management industry clients.

Ropes & Gray's Bay Area offices focus on the technology, life sciences, health care, financial services and asset management industries, with lawyers in practice areas including intellectual property, litigation and enforcement, privacy and cybersecurity, and transactions.

Looking to capitalize on an active private equity market in the Bay Area, the firm also brought on Matthew Jacobson, a former partner at King & Spalding, to expand its M&A group in San Francisco and Silicon Valley last October. 

Ropes & Gray has also gone through some firmwide leadership changes. The Boston-based Am Law 100 firm has named partner Julie Jones to succeed longtime chairman R. Bradford Malt at the end of this year, and tapped David Djaha to serve as its next managing partner, effective 2020.

The firm also recently hired Edward McNicholas, a former co-leader of Sidley Austin's global privacy and cybersecurity practice, to co-lead its data practice in Washington, D.C.

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