Talk:K&L Gates

Request edit 1

{{Request edit}} I am an employee of K&L Gates, and wanted to request a few changes and updates to the page. -Can you please update number of offices in information box to 37, consistent with addition of Brussels office in list of locations? -I believe the "notable employees include..." reference that follows "notable lawyers" section of text had previously been deleted based on what constitutes "notable" - can this "notable employees" reference please again be removed? Thank you for your assistance. Steelphantomrider (talk) 19:58, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

Sure, done. Please add new sections to discussions to the bottom of the page next time. --Gnom (talk) 06:09, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

Edit request deactivated, looks like it was done a month ago. Monty₈₄₅ 17:24, 3 July 2011 (UTC)

Request edit 2

{{Request edit}}

My name is Mike Rick and I am an employee of the law firm K&L Gates. I am writing to bring the community's attention to a few updates to the information currently included in this K&L Gates article, which I have outlined below. Please let me know if you have questions or you would like further information.

-In the introductory paragraph, the firm is now ranked as the ninth largest law firm in the U.S. by the National Law Journal and 11th largest worldwide by The American Lawyer based on headcount and 16th largest by revenue .

-In the second paragraph, can you please add San Diego (noted at end of first paragraph as a result of Bell Boyd merger) and Singapore offices to the listing of offices, which will then show all of the 36 offices noted in the information box?

Many thanks for your assistance.

Note: the tld|Request edit template means the request has been answered.--DThomsen8 (talk) 01:09, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

References

References

Steelphantomrider (talk) 21:12, 1 December 2010 (UTC)

 Done ThemFromSpace 09:06, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

Request edit 3

Good afternoon. My name is Mike Rick and I am an employee of the global law firm K&L Gates. I am writing to bring the community's attention to a few updates to the information currently included in K&L Gates' Wikipedia article, which I have outlined below. Please let me know if you have questions or you would like further information.

- The firm now has 33 offices worldwide, following the opening of our most recent office in Dubai () - In addition to those offices already listed, the firm also has offices in both Chicago and San Diego as a result of the March combination with Bell Boyd & Lloyd () and Singapore () - K&L Gates has been ranked by The National Law Journal as the tenth largest among U.S. firms () and by The American Lawyer as the 19th largest among law firms worldwide (). These would be more accurate rankings to replace text in the first sentence describing K&L Gates as "ranked the 7th largest in the world." Steelphantomrider (talk) 21:08, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Done. ThemFromSpace 05:07, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

@Steelphantomrider Request Edit

Mike,

Thank you. Good afternoon to you. I want to add myself as a notable alumnus of the firm. I don't know whether the firm's style is to refer to me as Valentine or by my nickname, which is Rick. I will use Valentine.

Steven Richards Valentine koinedthe firm in 1999 after a nearly 18 eighteen year career in political positions with the United States Government,

including service as a United States Senate Page in 1970 and 1972, as a United States House of Representatives Page in 1972 and 1973, Staff Assistant to the Chief Counsel of the of the b United States Committee on Commerce, Chief Counsel of the United States Committee on the Judiciary Subcommittees on the Separation of Powers and the Courts, Chief of Staff to Senator John P. East, Republican of North Carolina, Director of Policy Development and Communications at the United States Legal Services Corporation, and United States Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Civil Division of the Department of Justice under Assistant Attorneys General Richard K. Willard and John R. Bolton II.

After Valentine the firm in 1999, he was Of Counsel until 2002, when he was promoted to Partner. The Policy Management Committee named him as the Chief of Staff to former United States Senator Slade Gorton in 2001. I subsequently served as Chairman of the Political Activities Committee, Chairman of the Hiring Committee, and as a member of the Political Activities Committee.

Valentine also served in part-time political and governmental roles after he joined the firm. He was a member of President George W. Bush's transition team in 2000 and 2001. Valentine was appointed as a senior officer of Catholics for John McCain for President in 2008. He was on the presidential transition planning team for Governor Mitt Romney in 2012 and 2013. Finally, he was a member of Originalists Against Trump in 2016.

Valentine was a member of President George W. Bush's Presidential Review Board at the United States Office of Personnel Management in 2005. President George W. Bush offered him the position of General Counsel of the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development in 2007, but he declined in order to remain at the firm.

Valentine is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Edward Richards-Orpen Memorial Trust in Rathnure, Enniscorthy, Republic of Ireland. The Trust owns and operates the Monksgrange Archives, which is the largest private archive in Ireland. He also acts as the Trustee of the

William Valentine Trust, Gainesville, Georgia. Steven.Valentine (talk) 20:50, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

@Steven.Valentine: Wikipedia articles are not the place to promote yourself or post your resume. People listed as notable within an article should only be those who notability has been independently demonstrated by reliable sources and usually who have a wikipedia article written about them (note, not by them). Your persistent self promotion is unhelpful and unbecoming. Please stop it. Melcous (talk) 23:23, 5 October 2023 (UTC)

References

Request edit 4

{{Request edit}} I am an employee of K&L Gates and am writing to request a few updates, outlined below:

• The latest rankings of law firms by the National Law Journal and American Lawyer show us as 8th largest in US and 13th globally , respectively.
• We now have 41 offices total, if that can be updated in quick info box and Charleston added to the list of cities in which we have offices.; please note that the firm has no official headquarters location, if that can also be changed in both the info box and text.
• Under History section, Preston Gates & Ellis' founding date should be 1883 and the complete name of the firm formed through the 2007 combination (last sentence of first paragraph) should be Kirkpatrick & Lockhart Preston Gates Ellis (currently missing the Ellis)

Thanks as always for your assistance. Steelphantomrider (talk) 16:26, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

References

Can you provide reliable sources for the 1883 date and the post-2007 name. Please remove the tld| characters when done. Thanks for contributing to Wikipedia! Woz2 (talk) 02:12, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

I have updated the article per your sources but didn't modify the headquarters information. I don't know a lot about the company, but I did find this which lists the Pittsburgh location as the headquarters. A google search for K&L Gates Headquarters lists Pittsburgh at the top of the screen (not in a search). Still, it is listed as the Kirkpatrick & Lockhart, Headquarters, was something changed in the merge? Ryan Vesey Review me! 16:42, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

Request edit 6

{{request edit}} - While Pittsburgh was the firm's founding office, often leading parties to describe us as Pittsburgh-based, the firm does not declare a headquarters location - The description of the firm as a lobbying firm in the statement associated with current footnote 3 is somewhat misleading, as we are both a law firm and lobbying firm. - Under Notable lawyers and alumni, please consider adding former ABA President, Microsoft chief counsel, S.F. Giants Managing Partner, and Preston Gates/K&L Gates partner Bill Neukom: Thanks for your assistance. Steelphantomrider (talk) 19:09, 5 June 2012 (UTC)

References

Request edit 7

Good morning. My name is Mike Rick and I am an employee of the global law firm K&L Gates. I am writing to request a few updates to the information currently included in K&L Gates' Wikipedia article, which I have outlined below. Thank you and please let me know if you have questions or you would like further information.

- The firm declares no headquarters location ; while the legacy firm of Kirkpatrick & Lockhart was founded in Pittsburgh, leading many to believe us to be or describe us as Pittsburgh-based, the firm does not consider any of its offices a headquarters. - The Washington Examiner article cited in the article's introduction (footnote 3) was an article specifically concerning the firm's lobbying work, so its description of the firm as a lobbying firm to certain sectors is somewhat out of context within the broader firm overview. Rather, we are primarily a law firm that also does a good deal of policy work. - Under Notable lawyers and alumni, please consider the inclusion of former ABA President, Microsoft chief counsel, S.F. Giants Managing Partner, and Preston Gates/K&L Gates partner Bill Neukom: Steelphantomrider (talk) 13:44, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

References

Hello, I'll be working on this request. I modified the headquarters information. As for the lobbying firm information, it doesn't comply with our lead policies and I'll be moving it to the body of the article later, but I was hoping you might do a bit more. Right now, the information should be presented; however, it gives too much weight to the lobbying. If a section could be drafted, presumably entitled "practice areas", and was well supported I could add it. The section should mention that the firm lobbies, but can also mention other activities. Can you try to draft that? Ryan Vesey Review me! 14:02, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

I've also updated Bill Neukom. Please remove the tld from the request edit template once you have a drafted section. Ryan Vesey Review me! 14:08, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

Ryan, thanks for your help. Here is the information you requested, as well as a few recent recognitions you might consider noting for the firm either in place of or as in addition to the 2005 Corporate Scorecard listing currently included. Please let me know if you have any questions or need more information.

Practice Areas K&L Gates’ delivery of legal services is supported at both the individual office level and through seven firmwide practice areas

Corporate and Transactional K&L Gates’ corporate and transactional practice assists clients on such matters as mergers and acquisitions, corporate governance, capital markets, structured financing, public finance, securitizations, cross-border transactions, private equity, tax, outsourcing, and restructuring and bankruptcy, among others. In 2012, K&L Gates was recognized as one of the top 25 national corporate law firms based on a survey of nearly 2,000 U.S. public company general counsels by Corporate Board Member magazine and FTI Consulting published in the magazine’s listing of “America’s Best Corporate Law Firms.” U.S. News-Best Lawyers also named K&L Gates as the National Law Firm of the Year in Corporate Governance in its 2011-12 survey of “Best Law Firms”

Energy, Infrastructure and Resources K&L Gates launched its energy, infrastructure and resources practice in August 2011 , with the group representing clients in a variety of oil and gas, nuclear, construction and engineering, government enforcement, and energy and infrastructure projects, transactions, and matters.

Financial Services Among the areas in which lawyers in K&L Gates’ financial services practice assist clients are investment management; financial services reform and regulation; mortgage banking and consumer financial products; government enforcement; and white collar crime and criminal defense. K&L Gates’ investment management group is designated as a top tier practice in the Legal 500’s annual guide to law firms , while the firm’s consumer finance group earned as a “Band 1” ranking from Chambers and Partners in the financial services regulation compliance category

Intellectual Property K&L Gates’ intellectual property practice encompasses work in the IP litigation, life sciences, IP procurement and portfolio management, and technology & data protection areas. In a recent report on law firms representing Corporate America, Corporate Counsel magazine ranked K&L Gates second overall in IP work and tied for second for both IP litigation and patent prosecution based on responses from Fortune 100 companies.

Litigation and Dispute Resolution K&L Gates’ litigation practice area represents clients in a wide array of disputes, including international arbitrations, civil and criminal trials, class actions, and appellate work relating to insurance coverage, financial services, white-collar crime, construction and engineering, product liability, environmental, toxic torts, products liability, labor and employment, appellate constitutional and election law, and securities and transactions. The firm’s electronic discovery analysis and technology (e-DAT) team regularly serves as special counsel for discovery-related issues on litigation, governmental, or regulatory matters. In 2011, K&L Gates was ranked by The Lawyer magazine among the top 20 law firms based on litigation revenue

Policy and Regulatory K&L Gates’ policy and regulatory practice works with clients in areas ranging from government enforcement; healthcare; antitrust/competition; telecommunications; environmental; food and drug; government contracts; international trade; consumer product safety; and public policy and law, where K&L Gates is consistently ranked among the top six law firms for lobbying revenue

Real Estate K&L Gates’ real estate practice counsels on corporate and joint venture aspects of real estate, including investment, development, and finance; public/private partnerships; land use, planning, and zoning; resort, hospitality, and leisure; and distressed real estate.

Recognitions - The American Lawyer 2012 Corporate Scorecard ranked K&L Gates #1 for REIT Equities Issuer’s Counsel by Value and #5 for REIT Debt Issuer’s Counsel by Value.

- The 2011-12 U.S. News-Best Lawyers survey of “Best Law Firms” recognized K&L Gates with 224 first-tier rankings, placing K&L Gates among the top two law firms for most first-tier rankings This followed 2010’s inaugural survey, in which K&L Gates received the most first-tier rankings of any U.S. law firm.

- For the second year in a row in 2012, K&L Gates was noted by Law360 as one of the "20 law firms with the greatest global reach and expertise” in the publication’s Global 20 ranking.

Notable lawyers and alumni - Please also considering adding Bill Gates Sr. to this list

Steelphantomrider (talk) 18:13, 25 July 2012 (UTC) 1292simon (talk) 00:50, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

Hi Mike, sure I will add Bill Gates to the list. But I am declining the rest of the text. Although it seems factually correct, I believe it is too internally-focussed (ie lawyer-cruft) and not encyclopedic. For example, the launch of the "energy, infrastructure and resources" practice is only of interest to the general public because of the notable cases they have worked on. The content of an article about a company should focus on its products or media coverage, not internal things like as structure and policies.

Awards are fine to include, but it should be as a factual list, I think the current text sometimes is WP:peacocking. For example, a valid use of the U.S News reference would be "classified as National Tier 1 in 25 practice areas in the 2011-2012 U.S. News Best Law Firm Rankings". By the way, the 2010 result cannot be included, because it currently relies on a primary source (this is also a problem for the opening sentance)

If the suggested text was shortened into bullet points lists under headings of "Awards" and "Practice areas", I would support its inclusion. Sorry for the bad news, I am happy to look at it again if you would like to make these changes. 1292simon (talk) 00:50, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

History, Recognition, Offices

History: The existing text is very hard to follow, it would be easier understood as a timeline.
Recognition: Major unreferenced claim re leadership in industry has been removed. The article's intro says "... is a leading US-based", if this is based on the unreferenced claim in Recognition it should be removed. Or is there some other reason for the "leading" claim?
Offices: A list of every office is WP:trivia (especially since the number of offices appears in the infobox), a brief statement about the regions is more appropriate for an encyclopedia. Unless a particular office is notable for some reason?1292simon (talk) 03:17, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

As for history WP:PROSE prefers prose to lists. If you feel the text is hard to follow, revamp the text, but it is not best as a timeline. Offices, what would you think about listing all of the counties were they contain offices? I'll remove the recognition section as unsourced until it can be given a citation. Ryan Vesey 03:32, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for removing the unsourced claim. I agree that WP:PROSE is preferred overall for articles (so that a whole article reads nicely and isn't just a list), but here it says timelines can be used within an article. As a sidenote, it goes on to say that such a summary of information (which the content is- regardless of whether in prose or dot point format) "it is expected that the information will be supported elsewhere in the article by prose analysis of the main points". However, in this case, I think the summary info is useful, so I support making an exception and therefore not removing the section.

For offices, I think its ok to do it by country, as long as its a brief sentence (the section currently puts a lot of undue weight on this trivia). While there is no WP requirement for me to wait for you to respond before I edit, out of respect I will wait for your reply on this. Cheers, 1292simon (talk) 04:07, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

Do what you want, I'm removing this from my watchlist. Ryan Vesey 05:20, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

But if you plan to continue in this exception from the MOS, I hope it is in an overall goal of expanding/improving the article. To remove prose and replace it with a list without further expansion is bad practice. Of the two issues, I was more concerned with the prose. I wouldn't have reverted you had you only removed the list of companies so I was surprised that you selectively reverted me on the prose issue. Ryan Vesey 05:26, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

Ryan, thanks for the tip. I will keep WP:PROSE in mind for future. What do other editors think is best for the History section: Should it be in prose format? Or as a list timeline? Or removed (since it is not "supported elsewhere in the article by prose analysis")? Cheers, 1292simon (talk) 05:59, 26 August 2012 (UTC)

Introduction

The quote "a lobbying firm that represents the high-tech and energy sectors" is taken out of context so it can be used as a wp:peacock in the intro. The source uses the phrase to identify the possible conflict of interest of congressman now working for a law firm which, amongst other things, works for the industries he helped pass subsidies for (this is the the opinion of the article, not necessarily my personal opinion). The quote's use in the implies to the reader that K&L is the (sole or major) representative of these industries. This is not the intention of the original quote, therefore this sentence of the intro should be removed. 1292simon (talk) 04:07, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

I've adjusted the sentence text to more closely reflect the cited material. Mr Wave (Talk - Contribs) 05:38, 26 August 2012 (UTC)

January 2013 edit request

In information box, please update number of offices to 46 following recent addition of Seoul office , as well as four offices included in Middletons combination , which also brings our total number of lawyers to more than 2,000 if that can please be updated in the information box.

In first sentence of text description, please add Australia to list of the firm's locations:

Finally, under the newly-added corporate governance section, please note that Mr. Kalis has been chairman of the firm since 1997 , so perhaps we can change the "As of 2012," reference, which might read to some as he was just elected at that time.

Many thanks for your assistance. Steelphantomrider (talk) 20:52, 3 January 2013 (UTC)

I appreciate your caution in editing the article directly, but making minor, factual adjustments aren't ever going to be contentious, and therefore - in my opinion, anyway - present no conflict of interest: once the facts are in the article, it's in everyone's best interests to keep the information current. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 05:20, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

References