In a Rare Move, a Cravath Partner Leaves for Another Firm

It is almost unheard of for a partner to leave Cravath, Swaine & Moore, one of the country's most profitable and prestigious law firms. It is even rarer still for a partner to leave Cravath for another firm.

Yet corporate lawyer Sarkis Jebejian did just that. The law firm Kirkland & Ellis announced on Monday that Mr. Jebejian had left Cravath to join its New York office.

“Sarkis is one of the country's leading M&A practitioners with significant experience representing clients on a wide range of transactional, corporate governance and M&A work,” Jeffrey C. Hammes, the chairman of Kirkland, said in a statement.

A member of Cravath's vaunted mergers and acquisitions team, Mr. Jebejian has been involved in a number of noteworthy transactions, including working on the complex deal that merged Kohlberg Kravis Roberts's European affiliate into the KKR parent company and advising the independent directors of Merrill Lynch in its acquisition by Bank of Americ a.

He joins Kirkland, a firm that has built a preeminent M.&.A. practice in part due to several prominent lateral hires. In 2009, for example, it brought on David Fox and Daniel Wolf from Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom.

Mr. Fox made news twice on Monday. He was part of the team of Kirkland lawyer that advised Clearwire Corporation on its multibillion-dollar transaction with Sprint, and represented the financial adviser to Caribou Coffee in the company's sale to the German conglomerate Joh. A. Benckiser Group.

A Cravath “lifer,” Mr. Jebeian, 43, joined the firm in 1994 straight out of Columbia Law School, made partner in 2002, and has never worked anywhere else.

Such a career track is typical for a Cravath lawyer, or at least the ones who succeed there. The firm ranks as the fifth most profitable in the country, with profits per partner of $3.1 million, according to the the American Lawyer magazine. In September, DealBook wrote a story on Cravath's “lock-step” compensation system, which pays partners in a narrow band according to seniority.

Star partners occasionally leave Cravath - “planets occasionally spin out,” was how Evan Chesler, the firm's managing partner, put it earlier this year - but typically go to an investment bank or move in house. Robert Kindler, the vice chairman at Morgan Stanley, and James Woolery, a senior banker at JPMorgan Chase, were both Cravath partners. Julie Spellman Sweet left to become general counsel of Accenture, and Ronald Cami departed for the senior legal post at TPG.

Leaving for another firm is even more unusual. The last partner who made a lateral move from Cravath was W. Clayton Johnson, who in 2005 left for Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton. But Mr. Johnson left because he married a Chinese citizen and wanted to live in China, according to a person with know ledge his thinking. Other than a very small London office, Cravath has all of its partners in New York.

“It was a difficult decision to leave Cravath, and I will always cherish my career there, but I am excited to join Kirkland & Ellis and its talented team of M.&.A. lawyers, many of whom I have known for some time,” Mr. Jebejian said in a statement.

A spokeswoman for Cravath, Deborah Farone, said, “We wish Sarkis well in the next stage of his career.”