| Global London |
 The American FleetFollowing a year of highs and lows, London’s international contingent continues to invest in expanding horizons. With some big splashes grabbing the headlines, LB finds the US firms in London still riding the wave.By Claire Coe Smith and Chris Johnson During the course of 2009, one US law firm completely disappeared off the Global London radar. Kilpatrick Stockton, which hails from Atlanta and at one point had well over 50 lawyers in its City office, shut up shop in March last year when former office head and corporate partner Ken Boehner quit for IP specialist Bristows. The departure brought to an end one of the more colourful stories of a US firm in London, with Kilpatrick having grown rapidly following a startling decision to take on the UK operations of Altheimer & Gray in 2003, when the rest of the Chicago-based firm collapsed. Kilpatrick went from nobody to somebody overnight, with a dozen partner additions, but over the following six years gradually returned to obscurity. It is not the only tale of woe and it is certainly not the case that redundancies and downsizing were purely the domain of the large English firms last year. The headcount of our top 50 Global London firms fell 7% during the course of 2009, such that the biggest non-UK firms now employ a total of 4,305 lawyers between them on this side of the pond, a drop of almost 140 from the previous year. Even though total revenues actually rose to a record high of £1.83bn, compared to £1.76bn for the financial year ended December 2008, much of this was down to a still-weakening sterling exchange rate, with the falling pound helping to disguise what was universally a tough year in the City. When viewed in their native currencies, the average Global London firm saw fee income fall by 12%. To read the rest of this article subscribe to Legal Business. 
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