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Headquarters | CBS Building New York City, New York, U.S. |
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No. of offices | 1 |
No. of attorneys | 265[1] |
Major practice areas | General practice |
Revenue | US$1.13 billion (2023)[1] |
Profit per equity partner | US$8.51 million (2023)[1] |
Date founded | 1965 |
Founders | |
Company type | General partnership |
Website | www |
Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz (known as Wachtell; WOK-TEL) is an American white-shoe law firm in New York City.[2] Wachtell operates from a single, Manhattan office, making it one of the smallest firms in the AmLaw 100.
History
[edit]![]() | Parts of this article (those related to decades of the firm's history) need to be updated.(July 2025) |
The firm was founded in 1965 by Herbert Wachtell and Jerry Kern, who were shortly afterwards joined by Martin Lipton, Leonard Rosen, and George Katz.[3] The four named partners met at New York University School of Law where they were editors on the New York University Law Review together.[4] The firm rose to prominence on Wall Street during an era of brokers and investment bankers frequently launching small firms, but received little attention from established white-shoe law firms.[3]
Martin Lipton, a founding partner in the firm, invented the so-called "poison pill defense" during the 1980s, a shareholders' rights plan designed to foil hostile takeovers.[3] Acting for both sides of mergers and acquisitions; Wachtell Lipton has represented public companies, including AT&T, Pfizer, and JP Morgan Chase.[5]
Amid clashes at some college campuses, after the onset of the 2023 Israel-Hamas war; in November 2023, at U.S. law schools, it was among more than two dozen law firms that submitted a letter to 14 American law school deans, denouncing anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, and racism, and advising those mentoring future law graduates of entrenched workplace policies against harassment or discrimination at their firms.[6][7] Previously, the firm was also among 17 global law firm signatories to a public statement denouncing growing anti-Semitic attacks in the U.S. that was published in The American Lawyer in May 2021.[8]
Notable cases
[edit]Notable clients and cases have included Chrysler in the 1970s; the acquisition of Getty Oil by Texaco, during the mid-1980s;[2] Philip Morris in the 1990s,[9] and negotiation of the master development agreement for the World Trade Center after the September 11, 2001 attacks.[2]
The firm has represented clients in precedent-setting Delaware corporate governance cases in which the "poison pill" defense was upheld, including, in 1985, Moran v. Household International, Inc., with the court deeming Household International's defense as a "legitimate exercise of business judgment";[10] Paramount Communications, Inc. v. Time Inc., in 1989;[11] and, in 2011, Air Products and Chemicals Inc. v. Airgas, Inc., with a judge upholding its shareholder rights plan as defense against a hostile takeover of Airgas.[12]
During the 2020s, the firm represented Capital One, in its $35.3 billion acquisition of Discover Financial,[13] and OpenAI in the largest private tech fund-raising round in history.[14][2]
Rankings
[edit]As of 2025, The American Lawyer's 2025 Am Law 100 ranks Wachtell first among all U.S. firms in profits per lawyer, with profits per equity partner (PPEP) just over US$9 million.[15]
Notable alumni
[edit]- William T. Allen, of counsel — former Chancellor of the Delaware Court of Chancery; New York University School of Law professor
- Anthony J. Casey, associate — University of Chicago Law School professor
- James Cole, partner — Acting Deputy Secretary of Education
- Allison Christians, associate — H. Heward Stikeman chair in Taxation, McGill University Faculty of Law
- George T. Conway III, associate and partner — lawyer for Paula Jones in sexual harassment lawsuit against President Bill Clinton; founder of The Lincoln Project
- Chris Deluzio, associate – U.S. Representative
- Miguel Estrada — attorney and former judicial nominee
- Glenn Greenwald, associate — political activist, journalist, and Pulitzer Prize recipient[16]
- Maura R. Grossman, of counsel — research professor and former director of Women in Computer Science at the University of Waterloo; electronic discovery attorney[17]
- Elizabeth Holtzman, associate — former U.S. Representative and Brooklyn District Attorney
- Robert J. Jackson Jr., associate — Commissioner of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission
- David Lat, associate — blogger, Underneath Their Robes and Above the Law
- Kenneth K. Lee, associate — judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit[18]
- Matt Levine, associate — attorney, investment banker, and writer[19]
- Robert Morgenthau, of counsel — former New York County District Attorney[20]
- Bernard Nussbaum, partner — former White House Counsel to President Bill Clinton
- George Postolos, associate — former president and CEO of Houston Rockets
- Samuel Rascoff, associate — New York University School of Law professor
- Jed Rubenfeld, associate — Yale Law School professor
- Andrew Schlafly, associate — founder of Conservapedia, General Counsel for Association of American Physicians and Surgeons[21]
- Richard J. Sullivan, associate — judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit[22]
- Leo E. Strine Jr., of counsel – former Chief Justice of the Delaware Supreme Court, Chancellor of the Delaware Court of Chancery; University of Pennsylvania Law School professor
- Sheena Wright, associate – former CEO of United Way of New York City, Deputy Mayor of New York City under Eric Adams
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ^ a b c "Wachtell Lipton". Law.com.
- ^ a b c d "Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz | Company Profile | Vault.com". Vault. Retrieved 2025-08-26.
- ^ a b c Cole, Brett (2008). "Godfathers—Flom and Lipton". M&A Titans: The Pioneers Who Shaped Wall Street's Mergers and Acquisitions Industry. Wiley. ISBN 9780470126899.
- ^ "Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz | NYU School of Law". www.law.nyu.edu. Retrieved 2019-10-21.
- ^ Summary of corporate practice.
- ^ Sorkin, Andrew Ross; Mattu, Ravi; Warner, Bernhard; Kessler, Sarah; de la Merced, Michael J.; Hirsch, Lauren; Livni, Ephrat (2 November 2023). "Law Firms Warn Universities About Antisemitism on Campus". The New York Times. Retrieved 2 November 2023.
- ^ Ross, Chuck (2025-04-14). "At Harvard-Hosted 'Wikipedia Edit-a-Thon,' Law Students Target the Pages of Firms That Criticized School's Response to Anti-Semitism". Retrieved 2025-06-02.
- ^ "Big Law Leaders Pen Letter Denouncing Anti-Semitic Attacks" Law.com. Retrieved July 10, 2025.
- ^ Weinberg, Steve "Hardball Discovery" ABA Journal November 1995, Vol. 81; ISSN: 0747-0088, page 69, American Bar Association. Retrieved August 26, 2025.
- ^ Gottfried, Keith E. "Proposed DGCL Amendments Depart From Delaware’s Historical Approach to Activism and Takeover Defense" Delaware Law Series, Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance, February 18, 2010 | 500 A.2d 1346 (Del. 1985)| Retrieved August 1, 2025.
- ^ Gallardo, Eduardo "Poison Pills Revisited" Delaware Law Series, Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance | 571 A.2d 1140 (Del. 1989)| Retrieved August 1, 2025.
- ^ Hals, Tom; Scheyder, Ernest "Air Products ends year-long fight for Airgas" Reuters, February 15, 2011 | 16 A.3d 48 (Del. Ch. 2011) | Retrieved August 1, 2025.
- ^ Price, Michelle; Mandl, Carolina "Capital One's $35 billion Discover deal hinges on playing consumer champion" Reuters, February 21, 2024. Retrieved August 1, 2025.
- ^ Field, Hayden; Rooney, Kate "OpenAI closes $40 billion funding round, largest private tech deal on record" CNBC, April 1, 2025. Retrieved August 1, 2025.
- ^ "The 2025 Am Law 100: Ranked by Gross Revenue". The American Lawyer. Retrieved 2025-05-28.
- ^ NPR (2014). [1]. Retrieved April 15, 2020.
- ^ American Lawyer (2016). The Wachtell Way of EDiscovery. Retrieved June 16, 2016.
- ^ Lee, Kenneth K. (2019). "Questionnaire for Judicial Nominees" (PDF).
- ^ Matt Levine (2021-03-08). "Libor Is Going Away for Real". Bloomberg.com. Retrieved 2021-03-08.
I worked at one of the last remaining unlimited-liability partnerships in the biglaw business.
- ^ New York Times (2010). Dealbook - Wachtell’s Newest Hire: 90-Year-Old Morgenthau. Retrieved May 11, 2010.
- ^ Chen, Vivia (July 9, 2007). "Shhh! Pro Bono's Not Just for Liberals Anymore". The American Lawyer. Retrieved October 31, 2010.
- ^ Sullivan, Richard J. (2018). "Questionnaire for Judicial Nominees" (PDF).