Sidley Austin LLP

Chairman of Executive Committee: Michael J. Schmidtberger
Chairman of the Management Committee: Larry A. Barden
Number of partners worldwide: 671
Number of lawyers worldwide: 2,073

Firm Overview:
Sidley provides a broad range of legal services to meet the needs of its diverse client base. The strategic establishment of the firm’s offices in the key commercial, financial, and regulatory centres of the world has enabled the firm to harness its knowledge to represent a broad range of clients that include multinational and domestic corporations, banks, funds, and financial institutions. With over 2,000 lawyers in 20 offices around the world, talent and teamwork are central to Sidley’s successful results for clients in all types of legal matters.

The Americas:
More than 150 years after the founding of the firm, Sidley today comprises a diverse group of legal professionals who are dedicated to teamwork, collaboration, and superior client service. Sidley’s US offices now include Boston, Century City, Chicago, Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles, New York, Palo Alto, San Francisco and Washington, D.C. The firm has built a reputation for successfully representing clients on complex transactional, regulatory, and litigation matters spanning a range of legal areas. The firm represents US clients from a multitude of industries, financial institutions, and the government.

Sidley has maintained a valued presence in Latin America for over 50 years. It represents major local and multinational companies and financial institutions, private equity and other investment funds, sovereign governments and state-owned enterprises in transactions throughout South America, Central America and the Caribbean.

Europe:
The firm’s Brussels office serves as the hub of Sidley’s European Union law practice and is home to an experienced multinational team of more than 30 professionals. Sidley represents clients before the European institutions, the Court of Justice of the European Union and certain Member State bodies and courts, including the Belgian courts and administrative authorities. Sidley’s office in Geneva, Switzerland, is home to both its top-ranked international trade practice and one of Europe’s foremost international arbitration and cross-border dispute teams. The office comprises an experienced multinational team of more than 20 lawyers, policy advisors, economists, analysts, paralegals, and legal assistants. The firm’s Geneva World Trade Organization team is the top-ranked leader in shaping and enforcing international trade rules. The group represents many different WTO Members and leading multinationals and associations in complex WTO dispute settlement and in resolving trade disputes. Sidley’s London office, which opened its doors in 1974, has offered a combined English and US law capability since 1994. Unlike most US law firms in London, the majority of our 130 lawyers are English law qualified. This enables the firm to deliver a comprehensive range of high-quality legal services that meet the needs of clients conducting business in the UK.

Asia Pacific:
Sidley is one of the few global firms to have maintained on-the-ground client service capabilities in Asia for more than 35 years. During that time, the firm has come to be acknowledged by its clients and industry publications as a leading law firm in the region. The firm now has more than 200 legal professionals based in six offices in the region in Hong Kong, Shanghai, Beijing, Singapore, Sydney and Tokyo. Sidley’s lawyers provide US, Hong Kong, English, Singapore, and Japanese law advice to clients where and when they need it. The Sidley team in China is one of the largest of the international law firms, with more than 160 legal professionals based in its three China offices. The firm’s professionals advise clients on US, Hong Kong, English and Singapore law, and they speak fluent English as well as fluent and native Mandarin and Cantonese. The Singapore office serves as an important hub for transactions involving Indonesia and India, as well as Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines, Cambodia, Mongolia, China, and South Korea. The ability to provide both local and international law services will be of great importance to its clients as they continue to grow their businesses regionally and globally. Sidley’s team in Singapore provides multi-jurisdictional legal advice principally in the fields of capital markets; global finance, including bankruptcy, restructuring, structured finance, securitisation, and asset finance; mergers and acquisitions; international arbitration; investment funds; information technology, privacy, data security, and compliance; life sciences; and energy and project finance. Sidley’s office in Australia, based in Sydney, comprises US-qualified lawyers who either are native Australian or have worked in Australia for many years.