Texas law firm Hughes & Luce LLP will merge with international law firm Kirkpatrick & Lockhart Preston Gates Ellis LLP.

Partners at both firms today voted to merge the two firms, creating a law firm of more than 1,500 lawyers in 23 offices located throughout the U.S., Europe and Asia. Dallas-based Hughes and Luce has 150 lawyers across its offices in Austin, Dallas and Fort Worth.

The merger will be effective Jan. 1, 2008.

"Partners of both firms believe that K&L Gates will serve Texas businesses as a legal bridge to the globalized economy of the 21st century, just as it has in other parts of the United States, Europe and Asia," says Peter Kalis, K&L Gates' chairman and global managing partner and Edward Coultas, Hughes & Luce's managing partner.

The combined full-service firm will be called Kirkpatrick & Lockhart Preston Gates Ellis LLP and will have offices in Anchorage, Austin, Beijing, Berlin, Boston, Dallas, Fort Worth, Harrisburg, Hong Kong, London, Los Angeles, Miami, Newark, New York, Orange County, Palo Alto, Pittsburgh, Portland, San Francisco, Seattle, Spokane/Coeur d'Alene, Taipei and Washington, D.C.