Ten years ago, the antitrust practice at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati was four lawyers and a business plan. Today it’s grown to 64 full-time lawyers (up from an FTE of 55 when our judging period began) in Brussels, New York, Palo Alto and Washington, D.C., and earned a finalist spot in our inaugural antitrust litigation of the year competition. Much of the credit goes to practice cochairs Jonathan Jacobson, a 2005 lateral who had been antitrust cochair at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld, and Susan Creighton, who rejoined the firm in 2006 after four years at the Federal Trade Commission’s Bureau of Competition, including two years as director.
The practice earns its keep, and more: Although it accounted for just 4 percent of Wilson Sonsini’s head count in 2012, it brought in 8 percent of the firm’s gross revenue. As befits Wilson Sonsini’s Silicon Valley roots, the practice’s client mix is tech-heavy—Jacobson says that about 65 percent of its representations are of technology companies—but well over half its work is for nonportfolio clients.
