IP Trio From White & Case, Fenwick Reunites at Axinn in SF
The hires fall in line with Axinn's lateral strategy of picking up recruits from Big Law firms where partnership is increasingly exclusive.
January 27, 2020 at 06:25 PM
4 minute read
Axinn Veltrop and Harkrider offices. (Photo: Jeffrey Sauers of Commercial Photographics)
Antitrust and intellectual property firm Axinn, Veltrop & Harkrider has continued its strategy of hiring away attorneys from Big Law firms where it is increasingly difficult to make partner.
Its latest recruits are Jeannine Sano, formerly a partner at White & Case, and Eric Krause, a former counsel at Fenwick & West. The two have joined Axinn's San Francisco office as partners. Pan Lee, a former senior associate at Fenwick & West, will also join the firm as of counsel.
The three IP litigators practiced together at White & Case for about a decade before Krause and Lee left in September 2019 for a five-month stint at Fenwick & West, according to their LinkedIn pages.
One of Axinn's lateral hiring strategies is finding talent at big firms where the law firm economic system makes it difficult for attorneys to advance to the partnership, founding partner John Harkrider said last year.
Chad Landmon, chairman of Axinn's IP and Federal Drug Administration practice groups, said in an interview that the same circumstances played a role in Sano, Krause and Lee joining the firm.
"We have always attracted lawyers from big firms because we are a very entrepreneurial law firm that presents a platform for lawyers who are entrepreneurial and want to go out and bring in business," Landmon said. "Being in a law firm like ours provides an interesting platform for those lawyers because of the economics, and the flexibility to be more entrepreneurial in building their practices."
Landmon said that in Sano, Krause and Lee he saw a group with successful trial experience and expertise in the high-tech side of IP litigation.
"The high-tech space is an important area for the firm," he said. He added that while Axinn already had high-tech expertise on the antitrust side, "adding these three lawyers in San Francisco, in addition to Paul Zeineddin in the Washington, D.C., office, really solidifies our high-tech practice on the IP side of the firm."
Landmon declined to name any of the trio's clients or say whether those clients would be moving with them to Axinn. But he said the new hires will expand the firm's abilities in the tech space.
"Certainly, adding more of a West Coast presence will only help in terms of expanding both tech work and expanding [the number of] clients we will attract out there," he said, adding that he expects the hires to attract more talent to the office in the future.
While Landmon said he expects to see continued growth throughout the firm, he said it has no specific goals for head count growth this year. Instead, the firm will focus on strategic growth and continue to find attorneys that are a good culture fit: namely, he said, that they have an entrepreneurial spirit and want to go to trial.
Axinn, which was founded by three Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom attorneys in 1997, is continuing to grow. Its head count in 2019 was 86, according to ALM data, up from 76 the previous year.
White & Case on Tuesday confirmed Sano's departure and wished her well in her future endeavors. Representatives for Fenwick & West did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Read More
Seeking Rising Big Law Talent, Axinn Adds Simpson Thacher Lawyer to Partnership
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