Altheimer & Gray
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Altheimer & Gray | |
 |
|
| Headquarters |  Chicago |
|---|---|
| No. of Offices | 11 |
| No. of Attorneys | 300 |
| Major Practice Areas | General practice |
| Revenue | — |
| Date Founded | 1914 (Chicago) |
| Company Type | DEFUNCT |
| Website | www.altheimer.com |
Altheimer & Grey was a Chicago-based law firm. It opened in 1914 and dissolved amid escalating debt in 2003. The firm was well-regarded for its transactional practices, particularly mergers & acquisitions. At the time of its demise, the firm employed some 300 attorneys and 300 staff members with US offices in Chicago, Springfield, and San Francisco. It also possessed an enviable international network with offices in Bratislava, Bucharest, Kiev, London, Istanbul, Prague, Warsaw, and Shanghai.
The firm had benefited from the political connections of Chairman Gery Chico, the former chief of staff to Mayor Richard M. Daley, and Jeremy Margolis, a lawyer for former Gov. George Ryan.
[edit] Dissolution
The move to liquidate came in the wake of disagreement among the firm’s leadership over its strategy, as the firm had been hammered by a downturn in business and wracked by the defections of high-ranking attorneys. Followings its dissolution, much of its international network joined Anglo-French firm Salans while its Ukraine and Poland offices switched to New York-based Chadbourne & Parke. The high-profile private equity team decamped to Chicago-based Schiff Hardin and then recently switched again to global giant Sidley Austin. A group of tax attorneys joined Jenkens & Gilchrist, and they would form the nucleus of that Texas firm's Chicago office which would ultimately bring about the collapse of Jenkens & Gilchrist years later after a tax shelter scandal. Altheimer's London office joined Atlanta-based Kilpatrick Stockton but later a number of those lawyers moved to White & Case when Kilpatrick shuttered its UK operations. The San Francisco office disbanded and the partners scattered to such firms as Perkins Coie, Mayer Brown, Bingham McCutchen, and Seyfarth Shaw.
