So U.S. News released its law firm rankings today. They've put firms into tiers by practice area, and also by region. So you can be a Tier 1 firm nationally in Intellectual Property Law, as Irell & Manella is, but have your Orange County IP practice listed in Tier 2, as Irell does.
Digging through the data on firms with signficant California practices, a few things jumped out:
None of Quinn Emanuel's practices -- not even general commercial lit.! -- landed in Tier 1 nationally. By way of contrast: MoFo has 10 national Tier 1 practices; Latham, Gibson and Morgan Lewis each have 9; Orrick has 5; OMM, Paul Hastings, Cooley, Pillsbury and DLA each have 4. Wilson Sonsini has two -- private equity and venture capital.
There are 24 firms with a Tier 1 national ranking in IP law, including Sheppard Mullin and L.A.'s Sheldon Mak & Anderson. Not cracking Tier 1 were Valley IP heavyweights Orrick and Fenwick. Fenwick, in fact, has no Tier 1 practices.
But hey, that's better than ailing patent shop Townsend and Townsend and Crew: U.S. News has apparently never heard of them.
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