Womble Carlyle to Open Boston Office with IP Leader Sarah Keefe at the Helm

Sarah Keefe

BOSTON, MA —Womble Carlyle continues to grow by expanding into Boston effective September 1. The new office extends the firm’s footprint into the Northeast/New England region, giving Womble Carlyle a presence up and down the East Coast.

The office initially will provide intellectual property and other services to clients in pharmaceutical, biotechnology, life sciences, and related industries. Longtime Womble Carlyle IP partner and practice group leader Sarah Keefe will serve as Office Managing Partner. She will be joined by a team of veteran intellectual property attorneys who already are well-established in the Boston region. More attorneys are expected to join the office in the weeks and months ahead.

“Boston has been on the firm’s radar for years and makes sense for many reasons,” said Womble Carlyle Chair & CEO Betty Temple. “The firm has a well-established reputation in both Intellectual Property and the pharmaceutical and life sciences industries. Our clients in Boston will experience the trusted counsel, deep capabilities and resources our firm offers our other clients throughout the country’s leading innovation centers.”  Temple noted that Womble Carlyle already has offices in many of the nation’s other leading IP and tech markets: Silicon Valley, Raleigh-Durham, Northern Virginia, and Atlanta, plus the firm has a Delaware office to serve one of the nation’s busiest patent litigation venues.

In addition to being a match for Womble Carlyle’s services, Boston also is a good fit for the firm’s client base. Keefe said, “More than 140 of our clients already have operations here, and our lawyers are in Boston frequently. By establishing a permanent, physical presence, we can better serve these clients.”

The Boston announcement continues a dynamic year of growth for Womble Carlyle. In 4Q 2017, the firm will combine with leading UK firm Bond Dickinson to create Womble Bond Dickinson, a new breed of transatlantic law firm with more than 1,000 lawyers in 24 offices.

“The Womble Bond Dickinson combination already is paying dividends, as we are seeing top talent, including our new Boston colleagues, interested in joining our growing firm,” Temple said. “We’re excited to use this office to tap into the rich talent pool that is the Boston legal community.”

About Womble Carlyle

Womble Carlyle is a 500+-attorney law firm that corporate clients rely on to provide core legal services such as Complex Business Litigation, Mass Torts, Intellectual Property, Corporate & Securities, Finance and Real Estate.

Womble Carlyle’s existing offices are located in: Atlanta; Boston; Charleston, Columbia and Greenville, S.C.; Charlotte, Greensboro, Raleigh, Research Triangle Park, and Winston-Salem, N.C.; Silicon Valley, Calif., Washington, D.C.; Charlottesville and Tysons Corner, Va.; Baltimore; and Wilmington, Del. From this footprint, we serve clients in matters across the country and across the world. Clients trust us because we understand their businesses, focus on their successes, demonstrate a commitment to help and deliver value for their dollars they spend on us.

Thanks to Womble Carlyle’s alliance with Lex Mundi, the world’s largest association of independent law firms, we also can offer clients access to quality-tested local counsel in more than 120 countries. Lex Mundi provides seamless access to local attorneys and market knowledge throughout the globe.