Good morning,
This week's lateral market is led by antitrust and competition, with seven partner moves across six firms as government talent continues to flow into private practice from the FTC and DOJ. Paul Hastings made the boldest platform play, adding three partners across antitrust, fund finance, and capital markets. Ashurst Perkins Coie matched that count, landing its first lateral hires since the late-June merger with a six-lawyer tech-transactions team from DLA Piper in Paris. Kirkland & Ellis had the busiest outbound week, losing four named partners to Quinn Emanuel, Greenberg Traurig, Weil Gotshal, and Holland & Hart.
On the executive side, CIO and CTO appointments dominated this week's boardroom moves, with placements at Centene, Capital Group, Heritage Grocers, Trader Joe's, and AAR reflecting sustained corporate demand for technology leadership. In private equity, Partners Group is reshuffling its top ranks as David Layton transitions from CEO to CIO, while Abu Dhabi Investment Council tapped Lori Hall-Kimm from the Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan to lead its PE investment program. Waste Management announced its CEO succession for January 2027.
Now, on to what matters for your practice today.
BigLaw Moves Sentiment
Antitrust and competition is the week’s busiest practice area, driven by FTC and DOJ alumni moving into private practice as government enforcement activity continues to generate corporate defense mandates.
Energy and data-centre infrastructure is attracting strategic lateral investment as firms position for the AI-driven buildout cycle. Fund finance and capital markets remain growth platforms, with Paul Hastings executing a deliberate multi-hire strategy.
Firms with strong restructuring and regulatory benches are well positioned as cross-border deal complexity and regulatory scrutiny increase.
BigLaw Moves
**Thank you to our readers for your feedback on the grouping of the lateral hires section.
A few quick patterns worth noting: Paul Hastings and Ashurst Perkins Coie each welcomed the most partners this week (3 each) while Kirkland & Ellis saw the most net departures (4 partners departed against 1 joiner).
Hiring Firms by Practice
Antitrust & Competition
A&O Shearman — Anna Kertesz from White & Case (Washington).
Baker McKenzie — Bryan Bloom, counsel, from UnitedHealth (New York), an in-house-to-firm move.
Paul Hastings — Lisa DeMarchi Sleigh from the FTC (Washington), where she was a deputy assistant director reviewing M&A in life sciences and healthcare.
Quinn Emanuel — Catie Ventura from Kirkland & Ellis (Washington).
Sullivan & Cromwell — Sonia Kuester Pfaffenroth, a former DOJ antitrust official (Washington).
WilmerHale — Rebecca Unruh, former FTC attorney, added to the Washington antitrust bench.
Winston Taylor — John Thornburgh joins the Chicago office.
Finance & Capital Markets
Alston & Bird — Stanimir Kostov, finance (New York).
Mayer Brown — Michelle Herman, global trade finance (New York).
Paul Hastings — Daniel Margolis, fund finance, from Stephenson Harwood (London), extending a run of fund-finance additions. Separately, Jean Park, capital markets, from Cooley (New York), building out the equity side to match the debt-side platform.
Paul Weiss — Mandeep Lotay from Freshfields (London), to lead European structured finance and securitizations.
Skadden — Zachary Finley, global banking and finance leader, from Orrick (Palo Alto).
Litigation
Foley & Lardner — Dustin Greene, commercial litigation, from Kilpatrick (Raleigh).
King & Spalding — Phil Bowman, business litigation (New York).
Kirkland & Ellis — Prerak Shah, litigation and investigations, from Gibson Dunn (Houston).
Linklaters — Erik Haas from Johnson & Johnson, where he led the talc-litigation defense.
Norton Rose Fulbright — Jason Stiehl, Crowell & Moring's former Chicago office managing partner, into a competitive Chicago market.
Proskauer — Jaime Santos, co-head of Goodwin's Supreme Court and appellate practice.
IP & Technology Transactions
Ashurst Perkins Coie — Daniel Schnapp, trademark, copyright, and advertising (New York). Separately, a six-lawyer tech-transactions team from DLA Piper led by Stéphane Lemarchand and Jeanne Dauzier (Paris), the firm's first lateral since the late-June merger.
Finnegan — Hope Shimabuku and Christian Hurt, launching the firm's first Texas office in Dallas. Shimabuku spent a decade as regional director of the USPTO's Southwest Regional Outreach Office and was in-house at Xerox and BlackBerry; Hurt came from McKool Smith.
Private Equity & Investment Funds
Greenberg Traurig — Sheldon Hunt Laing, private funds, from Kirkland & Ellis (New York).
Simpson Thacher — Stephanie Epstein Srulowitz, investment funds, from Weil Gotshal. Part of a continuing raid on Weil that has added partners in London and New York, including a co-head of Weil's US private funds practice.
Weil, Gotshal & Manges — Jon Stott from Dechert and Michael Hanna from Kirkland & Ellis, both PE, in San Francisco.
Energy, Infrastructure & Data Centres
Gibson Dunn — a two-partner data-centre and digital-infrastructure team from White & Case (London).
Greenberg Traurig — Rose Schlichtmann-Prince, ex-Meta digital infrastructure (Washington and Miami).
Simpson Thacher — Erik Elsea, energy and infrastructure, from Skadden Arps (Washington).
Arbitration & Dispute Resolution
Crowell & Moring — Chiraag Shah, international dispute resolution (London).
King & Spalding — Thomas Voisin, international arbitration, from Quinn Emanuel (Paris).
Lowenstein Sandler — Hon. Michael A. Hammer (Ret.), joins from ADR.
Quinn Emanuel — Isabelle Michou named head of the Paris office following Voisin's exit to King & Spalding.
White Collar, Enforcement & National Security
Ballard Spahr — Lisa Zwally, securities-enforcement litigation, from Greenberg Traurig (Delaware).
Burr & Forman — Catherine Crosby, former federal prosecutor (Birmingham).
Freshfields — Danny Grooms, white collar (Washington).
Squire Patton Boggs — Tyler Wood, former DOJ National Security Division official (Washington), spanning international trade, foreign investment, and white-collar work.
Tax
Holland & Hart — Michael Farrell joins from Kirkland & Ellis (Salt Lake City).
Sidley — Deborah Paul, Legal 500 Hall of Fame, from Wachtell, to co-lead the New York tax practice. The latest in a run of Wachtell departures.
White & Case — Andrew Carlon, global tax (New York).
Regulatory & Public Policy
Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck — Christopher Hull, former DHS communications official, public affairs.
Holland & Knight — Kristen O'Brien, health policy, from McDermott (Washington).
Corporate / M&A
Davis Polk — Todd Kornreich from Ropes & Gray (New York).
Morgan Lewis — Andres Liivak joins in the Boston office.
Restructuring & Bankruptcy
O'Melveny — David Botter from Cleary Gottlieb (New York).
Willkie — Eugene Park, Strategic Capital and Restructuring Group (New York).
Life Sciences
Freshfields — Andrea Devoe (Boston).
Corporate Moves Sentiment
Technology leadership appointments dominate this week, with multiple CIO and CTO placements reflecting the corporate push toward AI integration and digital transformation.
These roles are increasingly board-level mandates that carry cybersecurity, data, and enterprise architecture portfolios, creating compliance, governance, and advisory work for firms with strong technology and data privacy practices.
In private equity, leadership transitions at Partners Group and capital formation hires at H.I.G. and Fortress signal continued fundraising momentum and geographic expansion that will drive fund formation and regulatory advisory mandates.
Corporate Moves
Asset Managers
Abu Dhabi Investment Council ($160 billion AUM) selected Lori Hall-Kimm as chief investment officer for its private equity business. Hall-Kimm joins from the Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan, where she oversaw growth in assets to C$24.2 billion from roughly C$20 billion.
Arini appointed Ben Kunstler, a Bain Capital partner, as head of hybrid capital. Kunstler will serve on Arini's private credit committees and help shape the $20 billion-plus firm's investment strategies.
Capital Group appointed Guillermo Veiga as CIO, joining in November to succeed Marta Zarraga, who will retire at year-end. Veiga previously served as chief information and operations officer at Standard Chartered Bank and held roles at Banco Santander, Amazon Web Services, and Cisco Systems.
Charlesbank Capital Management: Michael Choe is stepping down as CEO to become managing partner emeritus. Brandon White and Sandor Hau will serve as co-managing partners.
ECI hired Jessica Johnston as investment manager from Raymond James and Kajivan Kanthasamy as finance manager from Montagu Private Equity, as the firm deploys capital from its latest fund.
Felicis hired Tony Shi as investment partner from Pear VC and promoted Michelle Delcambre to general partner.
Fortress Investment Group named Harry Bush as head of private wealth for EMEA and Yuko Umino as head of private wealth for Japan.
H.I.G. Capital: Younghee Choi joined as head of Asia capital formation from Blackstone.
Impatient: Angèle Sahraoui joined the venture firm after three years with Slow Ventures.
Mirus Capital Advisors: Doug Stebbins joined as managing director from Consensus Advisors.
Northleaf Capital Partners: Michelle Joliat joined as COO from Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan.
Obra Capital: Colleen Kilfoyle joined as chief compliance officer from Sculptor Capital Management.
Partners Group: David Layton is transitioning from CEO to CIO. Roberto Cagnati and Juri Jenkner will serve as co-CEOs.
Redhedge Asset Management: Pierre Morel, JPMorgan's former co-head of global investment-grade and macro credit trading, joined to help expand the business and hire for front-office roles.
Corporates
AAR appointed Sanjay Sood as chief digital and technology officer, overseeing enterprise systems, infrastructure, AI, cybersecurity, and data and analytics. Sood previously served as CTO at CDW.
Advent Life Sciences added Gail Jermyn as investor relations partner. She previously was with Weight Partners Capital.
BP Plc named Ian Tyler chairman following an interim stint in the role, ending a period of boardroom changes and allowing CEO Meg O'Neill to continue reshaping the company.
CBTS promoted Mark Giles to CTO, where he will oversee AI adoption and product management. Giles has worked at CBTS for a decade.
Centene named Bradley Bolivar as CIO. Bolivar joins from Fannie Mae, where he led enterprise technology strategy. He previously served as SVP of enterprise engineering at Warner Bros. Entertainment.
Florida State Board of Administration promoted John Bradley to head of private markets.
Heritage Grocers appointed Gil Salazar as CIO. He previously served as CIO at Stater Bros. Markets and held director roles at Hyundai Capital America and Partners Consulting.
Hormel Foods named Ash Bhumbla EVP and CFO, effective September 8. Bhumbla joins from Tyson Foods and succeeds interim CFO Paul Kuehneman.
Kohl's appointed Arianne Parisi to the newly created role of Chief Customer Officer. She previously served as Chief Digital Officer. The appointment came alongside the departure of CMO Christie Raymond.
Liberty Media (parent of Formula 1): Philip Boeckman is joining from Cravath, Swaine & Moore, where he served as London managing partner.
Micron Technology appointed Manish Bhatia as President and COO, the company's first COO since 2012. He previously served as EVP of Global Operations.
Osaic appointed Sayee Bellamkonda as chief AI and technology officer. Bellamkonda previously served as chief digital and technology officer at Vialto Partners and held executive roles at CBRE, Ameriprise Financial, and American Express.
Playground Global promoted Rahul Meka and Daniel Yum to partner.
Targa Resources appointed Benjamin J. Branstetter as CFO, effective September 1. He succeeds William A. Byers, who is retiring but will remain in a nonexecutive capacity through year-end.
Trader Joe's named Prabash Coswatte as CIO from Heritage Grocers. Previously, Coswatte served as COO at Heritage's Cardenas Markets, CIO at Vallarta Supermarkets, and VP at 99 Cents Only Stores.
Waste Management appointed John J. Morris Jr. as CEO, effective January 4, 2027. Morris succeeds James C. Fish Jr., who will retire after more than 25 years at the company.
Heard on the Street
The BigLaw lateral market remains at elevated levels in 2026. According to Pirical, in Q2 2026, 75% of lateral hired partner came from within the Am Law 200, up from 60% in Q1, indicating that firms are increasingly recruiting established BigLaw talent rather than sourcing from smaller platforms or government. New York and Washington, D.C. continue to lead in volume, with Dallas and Houston posting strong quarters as the Texas legal market keeps growing.
On the executive front, Corporate Board Member notes that more than one in three new S&P 500 directors (37%) are current or former CEOs, the highest share since 2012. But S&P 500 boards are appointing fewer new members than they have in a decade, with departures outpacing appointments by 15% in 2026, marking the first time boards are shrinking faster than they are replenishing themselves.
That’s the rundown. See you next where law meets the markets.
-The BigLaw Markets Team
*DISCLAIMER: BigLaw Markets analyzes publicly available information, filings, press releases, and news stories published by reputable media sources to deliver content that highlights demand for legal services. Certain production processes may be supported by proprietary AI tools and are subject to human editorial judgement and review.
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