Numbers. Don’t. Lie.
Wachtell – the law firm with the highest PEP in the world – sits at c.$8.5m (i.e. only c.$500k more than Kirkland), but Wachtell only has 91 Equity Partners, compared to Kirkland’s 500 Equity Partners, which amongst other metrics, really puts Kirkland’s numbers into fairly staggering context. Now, not to sound like Thanos, but Kirkland’s continued growth really does seem unstoppable / inevitable…
Kirkland posted average profit per equity partner of $7.9m in 2023, up nearly 6% from $7.5m the previous year, with its revenue hitting $7.2bn last year, up from $6.5bn in 2022, an increase of more than 10%. A revenue increase of 10% YoY, in a year that many firms have said was a turbulent year, is particularly impressive, especially in the backdrop of the significant headwinds in the private equity industry — a key source of clients for Kirkland of course — where high interest rates have hit dealflow.
Its ‘closest’ revenue competitor is of course Latham, but even Latham are over $1bn behind them, so I can see why some commentators might take the view that Kirkland really are in a league of their own.
All lawyers at all levels from all firms will have their views on Kirkland, however, what is now truly impossible to ignore or deny, is that they’ve got their global growth strategy absolutely spot on.
