Paul Weiss hires top deals lawyer Langston from Cleary

Reuters

Published May 06, 2024 06:03PM ET

By Anirban Sen

(Reuters) - Law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison is hiring a top dealmaker Jim Langston from rival firm Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton as a partner in its mergers and acquisition (M&A) practice.

Langston, who has worked on several large public and private company transactions, activism defense, and corporate governance matters during his career, will continue to be based in New York and will join the law firm's corporate department led by star dealmaker Scott Barshay.

“Jim is among the best M&A lawyers in the country and is an excellent addition to our team,” Barshay said.

Langston's move is the latest in a series of high-profile hires at the world's biggest law firms over the past decade, as most corporate law firms have moved away from the traditional "lockstep" pay system that ties compensation to seniority.

Most leading firms now link pay closely to performance and are rewarding star deal lawyers with multi-million dollar pay packages.

In 2016, Paul Weiss lured away Barshay from another white-shoe firm, Cravath, Swaine & Moore, which at the time employed a traditional lockstep system.

In 2021, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer poached top dealmaker Damien Zoubek from Cravath to help run its M&A practice in the U.S. During the past decade, Kirkland & Ellis has hired several leading deals lawyers, including Eric Schiele, Edward Lee and Jonathan Davis, from rival firms.

Langston, who earned his law degree from the University of North Carolina, worked at Cleary for more than a decade and helped lead its M&A practice.

During his time at Cleary, Langston advised on several high-profile public-company transactions, including Medtronic (NYSE:MDT)'s $49.9 billion acquisition of Covidien, Allergan (NYSE:AGN)'s proposed $160 billion merger with Pfizer (NYSE:PFE) that was later abandoned, and General Mills (NYSE:GIS)' $8 billion takeover of Blue Buffalo Pet Products.

“Paul Weiss has the most sophisticated M&A practice in the market,” Langston said. “I look forward to working with this extraordinarily smart, collegial and dedicated team.”