Wolf Block, a storied Philadelphia law firm with deep roots in the city, is in merger talks with a Florida firm that could be concluded within a few weeks, lawyers familiar with the negotiations said yesterday.
The Florida firm is Ackerman Senterfitt, based in Miami.
The executive committees of both firms already have approved the merger, and the firms have begun tackling key administrative tasks, such as conflict-of-interest checks and combining practice groups.
A vote by partners at Wolf Block and Ackerman Senterfitt is expected within the next few weeks.
Sources said that the combined firm would be named Ackerman Wolf Block and that it would be run by Andrew Smulian, chairman of Ackerman Senterfitt, and Mark Alderman of Wolf Block. The combined firm, which would have more than 800 lawyers, would be one of the nation's largest.
"They are a lot alike; they are firms with a big regional presence," one Wolf Block lawyer, speaking on condition of anonymity, said about the proposed combination.
The firms have been engaged in merger negotiations for months, and the talks stumbled briefly several weeks ago over difficulties in combining their pension plans.
But those difficulties evidently have been surmounted, with sources saying that senior partners at both firms now see the merger as a foregone conclusion. One source said that Alderman has been visiting Wolf Block offices outside Philadelphia in recent weeks to advocate the merger.
Alderman was not available for comment last night, nor were lawyers for Ackerman Senterfitt.
In seeking a merger partner, Wolf Block is part of a trend that has been reshaping the legal world for the last decade and shows no signs of dissipating.
With about 300 lawyers, Wolf Block is a small to medium-sized firm in a market where clients have been demanding ever-larger geographic footprints and ever-larger teams to handle their most complicated matters.
Many firms of Wolf Block's size feel they are caught in the middle, at times too small to capture the bulk of the lucrative corporate and transactional work but too large and pricey to survive on only regional mid-market clients.
For years, Wolf Block - founded in 1903 - was one of the most illustrious brands in the Philadelphia legal community. Its lawyers ranked among the top legal movers and shakers in the city, and it had a reputation for hiring only the very best graduates of the top law schools.
Also, for decades it was the only high-end firm in Philadelphia that would hire Jewish lawyers.
It would take the firm 83 years to pass the 200-lawyer mark. But since then, other law firms in Philadelphia have grown more rapidly, with two - Morgan Lewis & Bockius and Dechert - each with more than 1,000 lawyers and other firms clearly within range of that mark.
Lawyers familiar with the proposed combination say that Wolf Block's strength in real estate transactions and estates and trusts and Ackerman Senterfitt's extensive practice in transactional law fit together neatly.
The 500-lawyer Ackerman Senterfitt firm is based largely in Florida, with offices in Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Orlando and elsewhere in the state. It also has offices in Washington, New York and Los Angeles.
It has extensive corporate and litigation practice groups, as well and intellectual-property, electronic-discovery and wealth-management practices.