Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP and Affiliates

About Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP and Affiliates

Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP traces its roots to New York City, where Marshall Skadden, John Slate, and Les Arps opened the firm's doors in 1948. Joseph Flom joined that year as the firm's first associate, and William Meagher became a partner in 1959. Meagher's name was added to the letterhead in 1960 to form the name the firm still carries today.

The firm has grown considerably since then. It now operates 21 offices across the Americas, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East, with about 1,700 attorneys working in more than 50 practice areas. Its Toronto office, on Bay Street in the city's financial district, concentrates on cross-border work: mergers and acquisitions, capital markets, leveraged and project financing, and corporate governance, along with related litigation, tax, banking, and restructuring matters for clients doing business between Canada and the United States.

Because Skadden is a U.S. firm, the lawyers in Toronto are admitted to the New York bar and licensed in Ontario as Foreign Legal Consultants rather than as Ontario lawyers, so the office practices U.S. law and doesn't advise on Canadian law itself. Associates who join in Toronto skip the traditional Ontario articling year and instead go through the same new-associate training in New York as their U.S. colleagues.