Morrison & Foerster
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| Morrison & Foerster LLP | |
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| Headquarters | San Francisco |
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| No. of Offices | 19 |
| No. of Attorneys | 1,000+ |
| Major Practice Areas | General practice |
| Key People | Keith C. Wetmore (Chair) |
| Date Founded | 1883 |
| Company Type | Limited liability partnership |
| Website | www.mofo.com |
Morrison & Foerster LLP is a full-service and large law firm. It has more than 1,000 lawyers in 19 offices, which makes it an example of a "megafirm". The firm was founded in San Francisco, USA in 1883; its largest office is still located there. It was founded by Alexander Francis Morrison, a graduate of UC Hastings College of Law. Its lawyers have experience in a wide range of areas, including corporate, finance and financial services, life sciences and technology, land use and environmental law, litigation, and mergers and acquisitions.
The firm has a major presence in Asia. Its office in Tokyo, which includes its closely integrated joint enterprise partner, Ito & Mitomi, is the largest American law presence in Japan, with over 90 attorneys, including over 30 attorneys admitted in Japan. It also has offices in Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Singapore. It is currently (2005) acting as outside international counsel for the Beijing Organizing Committee of the Olympic Games of 2008.
Morrison & Foerster is known best for its litigation and intellectual property practices. It has an IPO practice for emerging technology firms concentrated in its San Francisco, Palo Alto, and San Diego offices, as well as New York and Los Angeles. An increasing amount of its IPO work is being done out of its Asian offices due to the general downturn in the technology sector in the Bay Area and New York.
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[edit] Awards
Morrison & Foerster is consistently ranked on the American Lawyer's A-List. In 2005, the firm was ranked #11. In 2006, it moved up to the #6 spot.
[edit] Nickname
The official firm nickname, approved in 1973, is MoFo, which is also commonly used as an abbreviation/euphemism for motherfucker. As of February 28, 2005, however, the firm has returned to the more conservative Morrison & Foerster, although MoFo is still used as the firm's url: mofo.com.
During the dot-com era of the 1990s, when it was fashionable for American companies to appear irreverent, the nickname was prominently featured in the firm's advertising, both online and offline. It gained further notoriety through a bit by Jay Leno on The Tonight Show [1]. Leno joked that the firm's clients could shout, "Get me my MoFo lawyer!"
Additionally, the popular home game Trivial Pursuit has a question and answer circulating in current versions asking which international law firm is commonly known by the four-letter phrase "MoFo". The answer, of course, is Morrison & Foerster.
[edit] Offices
US: Denver, Irvine, Los Angeles, McLean, New York, Palo Alto, Sacramento, San Diego, San Francisco, Walnut Creek, Washington, DC
Overseas: Beijing, Brussels, Hong Kong, London, Shanghai, Singapore, Tokyo
[edit] Noted professionals
- Drew S. Days, III, who served as the U.S. Solicitor General from 1993 to 1996, and who currently is of counsel
- Beth Brinkmann, who was the Assistant to the Solicitor General of the U.S. from 1993 until 2001, and who currently is a partner
