Nixon Peabody LLP

Focus and practice areas

The firm lists more than 650 attorneys across a network that reaches the United States, Europe, and Asia. The site names nine core practice areas, and together they cover much of what a company or institution meets over its life. Corporate and Finance runs alongside Litigation, Intellectual Property, and Real Estate. Labor, Employment, and Benefits, Environmental, Healthcare, Franchising and Distribution, and Government Investigations and White Collar Defense complete the group.

That range means the firm handles both transactional work and disputes under one roof. A client can close a deal with one team and answer a regulatory inquiry with another. In my opinion, pairing a full Corporate and Finance group with a full Litigation group is the clearest read on how the firm is built.

Intellectual Property earns its own line on the list, and the firm names a partner who practices there. IP work covers patent and trademark filings, licensing, and infringement disputes, and it often connects to the Corporate group when a deal turns on who owns what. A technology company selling a product usually needs both sets of lawyers in the same room.

How some of this work tends to move

Franchising and Distribution work usually turns on registration, disclosure documents, and the contracts that tie a brand to its operators. Government Investigations and White Collar Defense matters often begin with a subpoena or an agency letter, then move through document production and witness interviews. Real Estate work covers acquisitions, leasing, and financing, and it can overlap with the Environmental group when a site carries cleanup questions. The firm names each of these as a standing practice, so a client in one of these situations has a defined place to start.

Healthcare and Labor, Employment, and Benefits sit close to the daily operations of an organization. Healthcare lawyers read licensing rules, payer contracts, and compliance obligations that shift with regulation. Employment and benefits lawyers handle hiring policy and workplace disputes, along with the plans that pay people after they leave. Both are areas where a client calls before a problem grows, and the firm keeps them staffed as named groups.

Where the firm keeps offices

The Albany office anchors the firm's New York State presence. Other North American locations include Boston, Buffalo, Chicago, Melville on Long Island, Los Angeles, Manchester, New York City, Providence, Victor near Rochester, San Francisco, and Washington DC. That puts the firm in a dozen North American cities across several regions.

Outside North America, the firm lists offices in Hong Kong and London. Those two cities give it a base in major financial centers on separate continents. A client with a cross-border question can reach a Nixon Peabody lawyer without going outside the firm.

How the team is built

The site names its senior people at the top of its pages. Stephen D. Zubiago is listed as CEO and Managing Partner, a title that places one person over both the business and the legal sides of the firm. Stacie B. Collier is listed as Partner and Chief Talent Officer, a role built around hiring and keeping lawyers.

On Lu is named as a Partner in Intellectual Property. Naming a practicing partner beside the leadership team gives the practice areas a visible face. In my opinion, a firm that publishes a Chief Talent Officer role treats recruiting and retention as a job worth naming. For a firm with more than 650 lawyers, keeping that pipeline full is part of the work.

Industries and international reach

The firm groups its work by industry as well as by practice area. Named industries include energy, financial institutions, higher education, technology, and nonprofit organizations. That setup lets a hospital system or a university find lawyers who already know the rules of its sector.

An industry focus changes how a firm reads a problem. A nonprofit board and an energy developer answer to different regulators and different funding rules, and a lawyer who works in one sector often carries that knowledge into the next matter. The firm's list of named industries points to where it has built that kind of depth.

The firm's international services cover Africa, China, the European Union, and Israel. These read as regional desks, each built around a specific region. For a US company expanding into one of those regions, a named desk gives a first point of contact for local rules and deal structure.

What the public record shows

The firm publishes client alerts and hosts events on regulatory and industry topics. That output gives a potential client a way to read the firm's thinking before making a call. As a reviewer, I read a steady flow of client alerts as a sign that lawyers are writing for their own clients on live questions.

The site lists social profiles on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, X, and YouTube. A public channel set at that scale fits a firm with more than 650 lawyers across many markets. The site does not state a founding year. Its pages do name the CEO and Managing Partner, and they list offices in the United States, Europe, and Asia.