Proskauer adds a four-partner leveraged finance team with Cahill roots. Lewis Brisbois loses a 29-person auto defense group.

Proskauer Rose brought in four leveraged finance partners in New York who previously practiced together at Cahill Gordon & Reindel. Bloomberg Law reports Lewis Brisbois Bisgaard & Smith lost a 29-person auto defense group to Womble Bond Dickinson, 15 lawyers and 14 litigation professionals handling more than 2,500 active matters, per Womble's announcement. Freshfields poached a Cravath, Swaine & Moore M&A partner in New York. Milbank poached an Akin special situations partner in New York for their alternative investments practice. Jones Day poached a McDermott Will & Schulte funds partner in New York. Troutman Pepper Locke poached a Mayer Brown insurance transactional and regulatory partner in New York. Sullivan & Cromwell hired a capital markets lawyer from Davis Polk & Wardwell who joins as a partner in New York. Steptoe brought in Morgan Stanley's executive director for US investigations in global financial crimes as a white collar partner in New York. Norton Rose Fulbright poached a Holland & Knight IP litigation partner in Dallas. Munger, Tolles & Olson poached a Paul Hastings patent litigation partner in San Francisco. Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman poached an Ashurst Perkins Coie venture capital partner in Austin. Simpson Thacher & Bartlett added a tax partner in Los Angeles. Akin brought back a former Disney lead counsel for corporate transactions as a corporate partner in Los Angeles. Cozen O'Connor added a startup and venture capital lawyer in Miami, hired from Sheppard Mullin, who joins as a member. Labaton Keller Sucharow launched a whistleblower practice in DC led by a former SEC acting chair and a former SEC senior enforcement counsel.

On the merger side, Fennemore and Gallagher & Kennedy will combine December 1 under the Fennemore name, with more than 800 lawyers and legal professionals across the firm, the firms say. Bloomberg Law reports Kirkland & Ellis added 64 associates across Texas on Tuesday, taking their statewide headcount to 549 lawyers and past Jackson Walker as the largest in the state, per a firm spokesperson. Bloomberg Law also reports the shareholder lawyers behind the $250 million Microsoft-Activision merger settlement are asking the Delaware Chancery Court for $60 million in fees.