Fennemore Continues Its Western Expansion 

Fennemore is continuing its strategic Western expansion, combining with the San Francisco Bay Area’s Wendel Rosen LLP. The tie-up puts Fennemore on track to crack the Am Law 200 list, a ranking of the 200 top-grossing U.S. law firms, in 2022. The combination, which became effective July 1, will create a firm with approximately $140 million in annualized gross revenue. 

In all, 56 attorneys and 45 allied legal professionals from Wendel will join Fennemore, bringing the firm’s total roster to 250 attorneys across the Western United States. The combined firm will be called Fennemore Wendel in Northern California and Fennemore across the rest of its footprint in Arizona, Southern California, Colorado and Nevada.

The Bay Area represents one of the largest technology and business centers in the world. Together with the team from Wendel, Fennemore will work to help its clients capitalize on this region’s phenomenal economy.

Fennemore’s move is consistent with the firm’s core strategy to go where businesses and people are moving while becoming a key legal services provider in the areas of real estate, land use, litigation and trusts & estates. In 2021, Law.com named Fennemore the fastest-growing BigLaw firm in the country. 

Over the last two years, Fennemore has completed three other major onboardings that include a merger with the Central Valley California firm Dowling Aaron, the addition of the Reilly LLP litigation team in Denver and a mass lateral hiring of approximately 50 attorneys and allied legal professionals in Southern California. 

Fennemore’s march forward is supported by a commitment to technology and a client-centric and people-first culture as evidenced by the firm’s 96% job satisfaction rating among all employees. The firm’s industry-leading 91.4% year-over-year attorney retention figure stands in stark contrast to the headcount loss of other firms during the “Great Resignation.”

James Goodnow is CEO at Fennemore.