Portland law firm to join forces with smaller Boston peer
Courtesy / Verrill
Portland-based law firm Verrill will expand its Boston footprint via a combination with Rackemann, Sawyer & Brewster. The firms are led by Verrill Managing Partner K.C. Jones, left, and Rackemann Managing Director Francesco A. De Vito.
Portland-based law firm Verrill will nearly double its attorney roster in Boston through a combination with Boston-based peer Rackemann, Sawyer & Brewster set to take effect on Jan. 1.
"We're combining our practices and bring all their folks to our offices, but it's technically not a merger," Verrill Managing Partner K.C. Jones told Mainebiz by phone on Wednesday.
The newly combined firm will operate as Verrill, with Rackemann’s entire professional and administrative staff relocating to Verrill’s Boston offices at 1 Federal St. over the next several months.
The move will expand Verrill's Boston office from 38 to 60 attorneys and put its overall attorney headcount at nearly 150.
"Together, we are able to grow our Boston presence strategically and enhance the depth and quality of services we can offer to our respective clients," Jones said in Tuesday's announcement.
Rackemann Managing Director Francesco A. De Vito, added, “As our lawyers interacted with Verrill lawyers over the years, we started to see a strong alignment from both a practice and culture standpoint. Most importantly, we concluded that a combination would allow us to better serve our clients by offering more depth and a wider range of legal services. The conversations that ensued led both firms to conclude that we would be stronger together.”
'Significant synergy'
The law firms firms bring more than 300 years of combined legal history, dating back to 1862 for Verrill and 1871 for Rackemann.
Jones said that while lawyers from both firms have been on opposite sites of deals for some time, their executive board chairs met over lunch in July where they talked about strategic plans and where the firms were going, "and there appeared to be significant synergy.
"We then followed up with lunch with the managing directors of the two firms, and the chairs of the executive boards, and it lasted three and a half hours," he said. "It was pretty clear at that point we had complementary practices and similar cultures, and that we had a really opportunity to be stronger together. That was only reinforced as those conversations continued."
Besides expanding Verrill's geographic footprint in one of the country's largest legal markets, Rackemann adds experience in several growth areas including real estate and trusts and estates, as well as an insurance regulatory practice that Verrill notes is highly regarded.
Verrill's current Boston offerings include real estate, litigation, trusts and estates, health care, intellectual property, labor and employment, employee benefits and executive compensation, and family law.
"The combination is all about being stronger together," Jones told Mainebiz, "with additional breadth and depth so we can provide responsive quality services at a reasonable cost across our footprint," including Portland.
He said the combination will also make it easier to invest in information technology and other areas, noting that "it gives us a better platform for attracting new talent, and not just in Boston."
Besides Portland and Boston, Verrill has an office in Westport, Conn. while Rackemann has offices in Boston and suburban Wellesley, Mass.
Jones said he hopes to engage the Boston firm's current management and other partners in management of the combined firm in roles yet to be determined.
Verrill was No. 5 in a recent Mainebiz list of Maine's largest law firms ranked by total Maine attorneys as of October.
For Verrill, the Boston move comes eight years after it joined forces with Portland boutique law firm Friedman Gaythwaite Wolf and six years after a combination with Connecticut firm Levett Rockwood.
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