In a state where big law firms keep getting merged, bought out or run from somewhere else, Sills Cummis & Gross is still headquartered in Newark — and still run from Newark.
Rich Epstein, who becomes the firm’s managing partner today, sees that as a huge plus for the firm. Its attorneys know how the courts, the judges, the government and other key lawyers operate.
“When we go into a court or when we have to deal with the government, they know us, they trust us,” Epstein told BINJE. “Clients hire us because of the respect and access that we have, both at the government and the judicial levels.”
Being run from Jersey pays off inside the firm, too. Ideas don’t have to travel far to be heard.
“You don’t have to go through three committees and fill out four forms,” he said. “You just walk down the hallway.”
That walk now ends at a different office.
Epstein, a litigator who has served as deputy managing partner for eight years, succeeds Max Crane, who has led the firm for almost 20 years and will now be elevated to chairman.
Epstein is just the fourth managing partner in the history of a firm that was created in 1971, following co-founder Clive Cummis, named partner Steve Gross and Crane.
Crane said Epstein is the right person to lead a firm that now has more than 150 attorneys.
“When I saw the qualities that Rich exhibited, not really as a leader per se, but as a lawyer, as a colleague, as a thoughtful person, it suggested to me those were several of the important things that a leader of this firm needed,” he told BINJE.
Epstein said he expects the handoff to go smoothly. It should. After all, he’s been the No. 2 person for some time.
He said it will be like “waking up with a different title, but still the same firm.”
Epstein talked with BINJE about growth, AI and the next generation of leaders at the firm. Here’s more of the conversation, edited for length and clarity.
BINJE: You step in at a time of a lot of consolidation in the legal industry. How does that shape your approach?
RICH EPSTEIN: I’ve been deputy managing partner here for eight years and I’ve seen a lot of change in the legal market. I’ve seen firms consolidating. Heck, in New Jersey, look at how many firms have merged or been bought out or whatever you want to call it. Max’s vision and my vision is the same: a smart growth plan focused on New York and New Jersey.
BINJE: That smart growth has resulted in the addition of 41 attorneys in the past 18 months. Walk us through the thought process.
EPSTEIN: We grew out all of our core areas — real estate, corporate, litigation — but with focus on two areas that had not been as much of a focus. First is white collar and investigations.
Over the last 18 months, we’ve brought on board Vikas Khanna, the former acting U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey, and Jonathan Fayer, the former chief of the Economic Crimes Unit at the U.S. Attorney’s Office. They, along with Joseph Shumofsky and Richard Sapinski, have really developed the white collar area. And of course, we already had Peter Verniero, who headed up a lot of our investigations.
Area two is intellectual property. We have grown our client base in Asia — China, Japan, South Korea — and one of the major areas is intellectual property. Scott Stimpson is the chair of our group, but we brought on Jason Sobel from Brown Rudnick to help build that up, and we’ve hired patent associates. We’ve hired a trademark counsel. We’ve really built up that practice that we can support both our domestic and our Asian clients in practices that are global, including ITC proceedings around the world.
BINJE: Intellectual property, of course, is a huge AI issue. Where does AI fit at the firm?
EPSTEIN: AI has been one of the big focuses that Max and I have done over the last year. We’ll continue to do so for the next few years. We are working with our clients. It’s an educational process, because when you say AI, what does AI mean? We view AI as being a legal-based, closed-universe generative AI programming that can help with more basic tasks and free up the lawyers to use their judgment, business knowledge, subject matter expertise, industry expertise to provide value-add to the clients. We use both Harvey and CoCounsel as our primary closed-universe generative AI programs. Think of it as another tool in the toolbox for us.
BINJE: Let’s get back to the growth. Tell us more?
EPSTEIN: We are in a growth period. The way that we’ve grown and what we’ve attracted is by looking at the New York and New Jersey markets, finding the best people in our core areas of practice. Even though that focuses on New York and New Jersey, obviously we need people who can support our more national practices — for example, our health care bankruptcy practice, as well as our national products liability practice.
BINJE: How does the firm break down between New York and New Jersey?
EPSTEIN: We have approximately 34 people who work every day in the New York office. The rest of the 150 are in New Jersey. We have one person in an office down in West Palm Beach, Florida, but the focus is primarily New York, New Jersey.
BINJE: You have Asian clients, but no office in Asia?
EPSTEIN: Nope. Our plan is smart growth in New York and New Jersey. It’s amazing to me the number of firms that are headquartered in New Jersey — large firms that are not part of some national firm — has gone down and down and down. There is Sills, there is Chiesa, there is Cole Schotz. And yeah, that’s about it.
BINJE: A lot of firms are expanding nationally. Is that under consideration?
EPSTEIN: By growth, I mean smart growth in our New York and New Jersey offices. We’re not looking to acquire a Des Moines, Iowa, office. Some firms just grow for growth’s sake. Some do it without a plan.
BINJE: Speaking of plans, many firms wake up and realize they haven’t done enough to cultivate the next generation. How does Sills handle that?
EPSTEIN: Let’s start with the transition itself. Max and the management committee of our firm several years ago identified and made me the deputy managing partner — for eight years now. If you’re going to transition to the next generation, the worst thing to do is just say, “All right, one morning we woke up and decided to do it.” It’s all about long-term planning. Max had a plan. Our management committee had a plan. We’ve executed that plan.
Similarly, we have identified young talents, both in our firm and outside of the firm, and cultivated them — whether it’s marketing, T&E access so that they can go fly to see different clients and try to generate more business, even AI.
What we have seen is significant growth in revenue originated by younger partners in their 30s, 40s, 50s, which makes us feel very comfortable that we have a plan to be successful not just this year, not just next year, but five, 10 and 20 years down the road.
BINJE: That might explain this stat: While Sills is adding, it rarely subtracts. The firm has not had a lot of turnover. Why is that?
EPSTEIN: Max Crane deserves a lot of the credit for that. We spend a lot of time here talking to our attorneys, finding out what they need. Just by way of example, we got Harvey as an AI program because we talked to our transactional people and they said, “Look, we really would like to get Harvey. It would be very helpful for us and our clients.”
And this is the advantage: When the managing partner, whether it’s Max or me, is sitting in New Jersey, all these people need to just walk down the hallway for a request or a “Hey, I have an idea.” It makes it a lot easier to get things done.
BINJE: What do you hear from lawyers at firms that went the other way?
EPSTEIN: I talk with people at other law firms who are not happy that their firms used to be more like us, and now, well, “I’m reporting to somebody in Kalamazoo, and I can’t get anything done.”
