Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom has promoted 21 lawyers to its partnership, a slight drop on 2023’s cohort when 24 made partner.

That is still more than made the grade in 2022 and 2021, when 19 and 17 lawyers were made up respectively. Women accounted for just under 24% of this year’s cohort, a nose below the 25% that made the cut in 2023.

Skadden’s domestic market dominated the promotions, with more than 80% coming from the US. London saw two promotions – international litigation and arbitration lawyer Nicholas Adams and tax lawyer Jisun Choi – while there was one apiece in Frankfurt and Brussels, corporate lawyer Ruediger Schmidt-Bendun and antitrust lawyer Niels Baeten respectively.

Skadden’s New York office saw the most promotions with six, followed by four in Washington DC. There was one promotion apiece in Wilmington, Boston, Los Angeles and Palo Alto. There was also one apiece in Chicago and Houston, though corporate lawyer Ralph Perez will split his time between those two cities as well.

The firm’s litigation department saw the most promotions by practice area, including Arthur Bookout in Wilmington, Christopher Clark in Boston and Caroline Van Ness in Palo Alto. IP litigation lawyer Leslie Demers and mass torts, insurance and commercial litigator Peter Luneau also got the nod in New York, as did Washington-based Supreme Court and appellate litigator Parker Rider-Longmaid.

Skadden’s corporate and tax teams saw three promotions each, with another three in its top ranked M&A team – Samuel Cammer and Daniel Luks in New York and Emily Prezioso Walsh in Washington. Antitrust saw two promotions, with New York-based Michael Sheerin joining Baeten in the partnership. There were also one promotion apiece in the firm’s labour and employment, national security and executive compensation and benefits practices.

On top of the latest promotions round, Skadden has also been busy in the lateral hiring market. This month it hired senior antitrust lawyer James Fredericks from the US Department of Justice, while in December it hired acquisition finance lawyer Sebastian FitzGerald from Willkie Farr & Gallagher in London.

The firm has also recently lost lawyers to Wall Street rival Simpson Thacher & Bartlett, including a four-partner financial services team in New York and Washington and London disputes partner David Edwards, all in February.