Renowned litigation firm Susman Godfrey LLP has named Los Angeles partner Kalpana Srinivasan as a managing partner, in the wake of the July 14th death of Steve Susman, the firm’s founder and longtime managing partner. Ms. Srinivasan, 45, was elected by the firm’s partners late last week. She will continue to be a member of the firm’s executive committee.
Ms. Srinivasan has won wide acclaim as a trial lawyer and a trailblazer for women and minority attorneys. Law360 called her a “Titan of the Plaintiffs Bar.” Benchmark Litigation named her “Intellectual Property Litigation Attorney of the Year” in California, and she shared honors as the Daily Journal’s “California Lawyer Attorneys of the Year.” National Law Journal named her an “Intellectual Property Trailblazer” and a “Winning Litigator.” Ms. Srinivasan has been named to Lawdragon’s list of the 500 best lawyers in America and to Benchmark Litigation’s list of the “Top 100 Trial Lawyers in America.”
Ms. Srinivasan has served on the California Bar’s judicial nominations evaluation commission; as Vice President of the Western Justice Center; and on the executive committee of the South Asian Bar Association of North America. She has taught a course on class actions at UCLA law school.
“I am honored and grateful to help guide our incredible firm — where I have spent my entire professional career — into the future,” said Ms. Srinivasan. “ We have an unparalleled group of lawyers, who will expand on the firm’s long history of success.”
Ms. Srinivasan joined Susman Godfrey in 2005 after serving as a judicial law clerk to the late Hon. Raymond C. Fisher on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. She graduated from Stanford Law School, where she was an editor of the Stanford Law Review, and she received her undergraduate degree from Yale University.
Ms. Srinivasan will serve as managing partner with Neal Manne, the firm’s other longtime managing partner. “Kalpana has been a superstar from her first day at Susman Godfrey,” Manne said. “She is deeply respected throughout the firm for her intellect, her vision for the firm, and for her wisdom and sense of fairness. Kalpana is a tremendous role model for all of our lawyers. I am delighted that she will help lead us as a managing partner.”
Ms. Srinivasan is only the 4th managing partner in the firm’s 40-year history. She is the first woman to serve in the position, and the first managing partner to have risen through the associate ranks at the firm.
