M&A, Disputes or Capital Markets: Transport Panels Need All Three

A general counsel choosing transportation and logistics law firms often looks for the one name that owns the sector's deals. There is no such name, and no single kind of work either. Sartori & Partners data show 423 transport and logistics deals in the 12 months to October 2026, and three deal types appeared on close shares of them: M&A on 26.7%, disputes and investigations on 23.4% and capital markets on 22.9%. A carrier, freight forwarder or port operator is buying three benches at once, and the list of firms behind them is level rather than steep.

Each share below counts the deals carrying a type among all of the sector's deals, including deals with no type on record, so the shares are read one at a time and never added up. Side by side, they are unusually close. M&A comes first at 26.7%, disputes and investigations follow at 23.4%, and capital markets sits at 22.9%, a gap of 3.8 points from first to third. Across the whole deal market the same three types spread wider, from 19.3% for M&A to 25.7% for capital markets, a gap of 6.4 points.

Nearby sectors lean one way. Industrial manufacturing is an M&A sector, with M&A on 40.0% of its deals and disputes on only 11.1%. Aviation leans on securities work, with capital markets on 35.8% of its deals against 20.2% for M&A. Automotive comes closest, yet its first and third types still sit 6.6 points apart. Of all the sectors in the Sartori & Partners deal records that list the three types, transport and logistics has the narrowest spread between them.

For a legal department, the consequence is that the panel cannot be sized around one dominant matter type. A year that brings an acquisition, a securities offering and a contested claim is the ordinary year in this sector, not the unusual one, and each of those calls on a different team.

The balance is not a copy of the market. M&A appears on 26.7% of transport deals against 19.3% of all deals, while capital markets sits a little lower, 22.9% against 25.7%. Disputes and investigations are close to the norm at 23.4% against 25.0%. The practice records point the same way: corporate and M&A lawyers worked on 32.2% of transport deals against 23.3% market-wide, and banking and finance lawyers on 11.6% against 6.3%.

A deal can carry several practices, so these shares overlap. One smaller line stands out: product liability and torts lawyers worked on 5.2% of transport and logistics deals, against 2.1% of all deals. That share rests on 22 deals, so it is a rough size rather than a ranking, but it points to a claims bench sitting next to the deal benches. Our companion report on transportation litigation lawyers looks at that bench from the hiring side, through the lawyers who change firms; this report stays with who handles the deals. Treat product liability as its own line on the panel, staffed and priced apart from the transactional work.

The firm list is level. Latham & Watkins, Jones Day, Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer, White & Case, Davis Polk & Wardwell and Baker McKenzie share the 11-20 band of transport deals. Kirkland & Ellis, DLA Piper, Clifford Chance and A&O Shearman sit one band lower, in 6-10. Bands are ranges of deals, so firms inside one band are close in volume and their order says little.

Other sectors are steeper at the top. In automotive, Latham & Watkins sits alone in the 41-60 band, one band above the next firm. In transport and logistics no firm stands a band clear. Most of the names also appear in the market's own table of deal advisers; Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer and Baker McKenzie are on the transport list without ranking in the market's top 10. Sartori & Partners records count 225 distinct transport and logistics clients behind these deals, so the work is spread across many buyers as well as many advisers.

A level list gives a company real choice. Two or three firms from the same band can split the work without giving up deal experience in the sector, and a pitch can be decided on staffing, coverage and price rather than on volume.

Each city figure is the share of the sector's deals, among those with a known lawyer location, that had lawyers working on them from the city; a deal staffed from two cities counts in both, so the shares overlap. Lawyers in New York worked on 23.2% of transport and logistics deals, the lowest New York share of the four sectors compared here: it reaches 38.6% in aviation, 31.9% in industrial manufacturing and 30.1% in automotive. London follows at 16.6%, then Chicago at 9.0% and Washington, DC at 8.4%.

Further down, the map turns international. Lawyers in Frankfurt worked on 7.6% of the sector's deals, close to Paris at 6.0%. 5.7% of transport and logistics deals were handled with lawyers in Hong Kong, a city that appears on none of the deal-city lists for aviation, automotive or industrial manufacturing. Frankfurt itself is not unique to transport, since lawyers there worked on 15.0% of automotive deals. What differs is the spread: one list running from Chicago and Los Angeles to Frankfurt, Paris and Hong Kong.

A panel built on New York and London covers the two largest cities and leaves continental and Asian matters to whatever office a firm happens to have there. Ask each firm which of these cities its transport team actually works from, and who would lead a matter that starts in Hong Kong.

The count of transport and logistics deals held flat (+3.1%) year on year, 436 against 423 in the settled 12-month windows, while deals across the market rose 10.6%. The sector has not kept pace with the wider deal flow, but it has not shrunk either: demand for the same three benches is steady.

Values are disclosed on 19.1% of transport and logistics deals in the Sartori & Partners records, with a median of $600 million where a value is public. That sits between automotive, at a median of $500 million, and aviation, at $747.5 million. A disclosed median is a guide to deal size on the public part of the record, not a measure of fees. For budgeting, it suggests mid-sized matters arriving at a stable pace, which favors a standing panel with agreed rates over ad hoc instructions.

Build the panel for three kinds of work. M&A, disputes and capital markets appear on close shares of transport deals, 26.7%, 23.4% and 22.9%, so a firm that is strong in one and thin in the other two will leave a gap every year. Ask each candidate for its transport matters by deal type, not a single total.

Use the level firm list. With six firms sharing the 11-20 band, no adviser has volume the others cannot match, and a shortlist from that band can be chosen for coverage. Check the map before signing: lawyers in Hong Kong worked on 5.7% of the sector's deals and lawyers in Frankfurt on 7.6%, so confirm who staffs a matter there. Keep product liability on its own line, priced apart from the deal teams.