Desmarais LLP, the elite intellectual property litigation boutique based in Silicon Valley, has announced a significant increase to associate base salaries effective July 1.
The firm has informed both associates and summer associates of the pay increases, with particularly strong benefits directed at attorneys in their first three years of practice.
Desmarais has built a reputation over more than a decade for staying ahead of the market on compensation, a posture it adopted aggressively around 2012.
The firm made the salary benchmark “NY to $180” a reality years ahead of the rest of the industry, cementing its identity as a compensation leader among boutique practices.
The most junior lawyers stand to benefit most from the latest round of increases, with first-year salaries rising to $255,000 under the new structure.
The class of 2022 also catches up with the broader market, though the firm has deliberately weighted the increases toward its youngest attorneys.
At more senior levels, Desmarais compensation aligns with Milbank-scale firms, but the comparison between the two structures does not tell the full story.
A fifth-year associate at a Milbank-scale firm earning $385,000 typically does so while chasing demanding billable hour targets that define much of their working life.
Desmarais operates on an entirely different billing model, charging clients by litigation stage and result rather than by the hour, meaning associates face no hourly targets whatsoever.
That structural difference carries a genuine psychological benefit, particularly in the final months of a calendar year when billable hour pressure at larger firms tends to peak sharply.
The firm has long positioned itself as a place where lawyers can develop into elite IP litigators without the administrative burden that accompanies the traditional Biglaw model.
For the wider legal industry, which has largely struggled to match the Milbank scale at all, Desmarais represents an outlier prepared to move faster and more generously than its competitors.