Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan has made up 14 partners, of whom 10 are women, accounting for 70% of the cohort.

This year’s tally is double last year’s class of seven new partners and falls just one short of the 18 attorneys promoted in 2021, the largest such class in the firm’s history.

The proportion of women, however, well exceeds last year’s figure of 42% and the 28% achieved in 2021.

Thirteen of this year’s promotions at the disputes-focused firm, which were voted through at the firm’s partnership meeting on 9 December, are based in the US, with one solitary promotion overseas, that of Beijing-based Yixuan Zhu.

Zhu, one of the founding lawyers of the firm’s China practice, worked in the firm’s New York office for several years before returning to China and marries her US experience in high-value federal and state litigation with work on international commercial and investor-state arbitrations, as well as related regulatory and enforcement proceedings.

Of the US appointments, the New York office sees seven promotions, Boston and San Francisco two apiece, with Houston and Silicon Valley each welcoming one new partner.

Two of the new partners divide their time between two offices. White collar specialist Samantha Gillespie is based out of New York and Washington DC; while arbitration specialist Jules Jaquith spends time in Houston and the US capital city.

“We have an extraordinary talent pool of attorneys spanning the globe, and they are essential to our ability to provide clients with the elite level of service and representation they expect from this firm,” said firm founder and executive chairman John Quinn. “Our new partner class reflects the quality of our hiring and the emphasis we place on training and nurturing the world’s top young legal talent.”

This is the second round of promotions overseen under new leadership arrangements ushered in by Quinn in 2022, which saw him elevated from managing partner to executive chairman assisted by co-managing partners Washington DC-based William Burck and New York-based Michael Carlinsky.

Since Quinn – and three other lawyers – founded the specialist litigation firm in 1986 it has grown into a top 30 US firm with a billion-dollar turnover generated by more than 1,000 lawyers based across 33 offices, including a forthcoming office in Singapore.

There were no partner promotions in Europe: the firm has focused on securing lateral hires in London this year, having made a sole partner promotion last year.

London hires includes the arrival of tech litigator Gemma Anderson, this week, from Morrison & Foerster. It hired arbitration partner Melis Acuner from Cadwalader Wickersham & Taft in September, IP partner David Lancaster from Pinsent Masons in August, while competition partner Lambros Kilaniotis moved across from RPC in January 2023.

In October, the firm hired Avi Perry, chief of the US Department of Justice’s market integrity and major frauds unit, as a partner in Washington DC, where he will co-chair the securities litigation and commodities and derivatives groups.

A month earlier the firm hired two partners in the United Arab Emirates from King & Wood Mallesons to open offices in Dubai and Abu Dhabi. 

The full list of partners

K. McKenzie Anderson (New York) 
Kathryn Bonacorsi  (New York)
Jodie Cheng (San Francisco) 
Peter Fountain (New York)
Samantha Gillespie (New York and Washington DC)
Julianne “Jules” Jaquith (Houston and Washington DC)
Lauren Martin (Boston)
Michael Packard (Boston)
Sara Pollock (Silicon Valley)
Ryan Rakower (New York)
Hope Skibitsky (New York) 
Courtney Whang (New York) 
Yixuan Zhu (Beijing)
Ognjen (“Ogi”) Zivojnovic (San Francisco)