Kirkland & Ellis Strengthens M&A Practice with Hire of Allison Wein

Kirkland & Ellis LLP is excited to announce that Allison Wein has joined the Firm as a partner in the Corporate Practice Group in New York.

“Allie is an exceptionally talented lawyer and rising M&A star who has advised on some of the largest and most complex M&A deals in the market,” said Jon A. Ballis, Chairman of Kirkland’s Executive Committee. “As we continue to invest in our strategic M&A business, leading next generation talent like Allie will help us keep pace with demand and provide clients with the market-leading advice they’ve come to expect from Kirkland.” 

Ms. Wein’s practice primarily encompasses mergers and acquisitions and general corporate matters. Her experience spans the range of M&A activity including significant cross-border and contested transactions and activism defense. High-profile assignments for Ms. Wein include representing Disney in its $85 billion acquisition of 21st Century Fox, overcoming an interloper bid by Comcast to its original $66 billion agreement; British American Tobacco in its $97 billion merger with Reynolds American; Precision Castparts in its $37.2 billion acquisition by Berkshire Hathaway; AerCap in its $28 billion acquisition of International Lease Finance from AIG, and AveXis in its $8.7 billion acquisition by Novartis, among others.  

“Allie is one of the brightest young M&A talents in the legal world and has developed a reputation as a savvy, go-to advisor for major deals,” said Eric Schiele, a corporate partner and a member of the Firm’s Executive Committee. “Her experience counselling clients on high-stakes, transformative M&A matters will complement the incredibly strong platform we have established in New York and across the Firm.”

Ms. Wein was named an M&A “Rising Star” by Law360 in 2020, recognizing her as one of five outstanding M&A lawyers in the nation under the age of 40. In 2019, she was named an M&A “Rising Star” by The Deal. Ms. Wein has also been recognized for her work in M&A by IFLR1000 and Lawdragon and for her transactional work in the technology industry and the media and entertainment industry by The Legal 500 U.S.

“Kirkland has an extremely talented and dynamic group of M&A lawyers and I’m excited to join the team,” said Ms. Wein. “This is a wonderful opportunity to pursue new challenges and to help grow the already stellar M&A platform at Kirkland even further.”

Ms. Wein received a J.D. from Northwestern University School of Law and a B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania. She was previously a partner at Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP in New York.

Kirkland’s M&A Practice Group maintains its position at the forefront of significant and cutting-edge transactions across all major industries. Kirkland ranked #1 across all key metrics for Bloomberg’s 2021 year-end league tables, including for both global and U.S. M&A by value and deal count. Kirkland continues to attract the industry’s brightest M&A talent. In addition to Ms. Wein, hires in the past five years have included Rachael Coffey, Jonathan Davis, David Klein, Edward Lee and Eric Schiele.