McDermott Will & Emery LLP recently moved its Orange County office to a new address.
The Chicago-based law firm expanded its office space in Irvine, moving from the current abode at the Lakeshore Towers office to 4 Park Plaza in the Jamboree Center office complex.
McDermott occupies two full floors of the building, which total 45,500 square feet.
The new office will accommodate about 60 attorneys.
McDermott has 46 attorneys locally, including 19 partners.
“We’re happy to be moving into much bigger quarters,” said Fay Morisseau, partner-in-charge of the Orange County office. “We’ve been in our office for about 12 years. We have grown out of the office. Everyone was looking forward to moving to a larger place. It’s about a 50% increase.”
Morisseau said he estimates the firm’s old Irvine office to be about 32,000 square feet.
Local Hiring
McDermott’s Orange County office saw an increase of 16 attorneys last year, the biggest growth over the past 12 months among law firms here. The firm has about 110 employees total in Irvine.
“We had a few attorneys move from San Diego to here,” Morisseau said. “It’s basically a sign of very significant growth in our client demands.”
The firm counts intellectual property work as the biggest part of its practice here.
“That kept us busy both in the prosecution and litigation sides,” Morisseau said.
The firm also engages in corporate work, securities and commercial litigation, and anti-trust matters.
OC Clients
McDermott counts a number of local clients, including disk drive maker Western Digital Corp., Toshiba America Electronic Components Inc. and FlexEnergy Inc.—all based in Irvine. It also works with solid-state storage drive maker STEC Inc. in Santa Ana.
Other California clients are Commerce-based Linx Professional Grills Inc. and Mountain View-based Google Inc.
McDermott has 17 offices around the U.S. and internationally.
McDermott was busy moving and expanding its office space last year, as it made five moves throughout 2011.
It relocated its Miami office into a new 30,205-square-foot building last Septem-ber.
It also moved its international offices in Brussels, Belgium; Milan, Italy; and London, in addition to opening an office in Paris in April.
The firm is expected to move into a new 171,000-square-foot office space in Wash-ington, D.C., in October. “Our office move in Orange County is part of the firm’s continued investment in growing our practice areas and expanding the McDermott brand with an eye on the future,” said Peter Sacripanti, New York-based co-chair of McDermott Will & Emery.
“In this case, as in many of the other office moves, we have taken advantage of changing real estate markets to obtain premiere office space at the right time,” Sacripanti noted.
