Miles Scully Invite Miles to Speak

Trial lawyer · Firm builder · Author

Litigation is a business.
Its economics are about to change.

Miles Scully is a nationally recognized trial lawyer, named partner and Chairman Emeritus of Gordon Rees Scully Mansukhani, and the architect of the first law firm with offices in all fifty states.

He writes and speaks about what happens when capital and artificial intelligence collide with the way legal disputes are priced, staffed, and resolved — and what business leaders should do about it.

Invite Miles to Speak → Explore the Thesis
Portrait of Miles Scully, smiling, in a navy pinstripe jacket
Miles Scully

About

Thirty years in the courtroom. One national firm.

Miles has tried cases as first chair for some of the world's largest companies and spent the better part of two decades turning a regional San Francisco firm into a national platform. He has been on both sides of litigation economics: inside the courtroom, and inside the business that funds it.

50
States with a GRSM office. The first and only full-service law firm to do it, since April 2019.
2,000+
Lawyers today, up from roughly 940 when the fifty-state platform launched.
#6
Largest law firm in the United States by attorney headcount (Law360 400, 2026), up from #11 the year before.
½
Of the Fortune 500 served by the firm he helped build.
GRSM50 logo

Gordon Rees Scully Mansukhani Your 50 State Law Firm™

GRSM50 is the platform Miles designed. One firm, one point of contact, and consistent service in every state, built so national clients never have to assemble a patchwork of local counsel. He remains a named partner and Chairman Emeritus of the firm.

GRSM50 and "Your 50 State Law Firm" are trademarks of Gordon Rees Scully Mansukhani, LLP.

The trial lawyer

Miles has served as first chair in dozens of trials and highly publicized verdicts, representing some of the world's largest companies and many well-known public figures. In 2016 The National Law Journal selected his defense verdict for Urban Outfitters and Anthropologie, a California class action with more than a billion dollars of exposure and a $288 million demand, as one of the most outstanding results in the country.

The firm builder

In 2014 the firm added his name to its own in recognition of his role in its growth. Five years later it became the first law firm with offices in all fifty states, a platform Miles designed and drove. Since then the firm has roughly doubled in size, added twenty offices, climbed from #103 to #70 on the Am Law 100, and in 2026 became the sixth-largest law firm in the country by headcount.

"Our unique 50-state platform has been the primary engine fueling GRSM's meteoric growth."
Miles Scully, on the firm's rise to sixth-largest in the nation, June 2026

Recognition

  • National Law JournalNamed among the 25 foremost trial attorneys in the United States; featured in the "Winning" report of the nation's most outstanding verdicts (2016).
  • Daily JournalTop 100 Lawyers in California; a verdict named among the 20 Top Defense Results of the year.
  • Daily TranscriptTop 10 Trial Attorney, San Diego.
  • Thomson ReutersTop 50 Attorney.
  • The American LawyerProfiled in the "Litigation Leaders" column on the value of a fifty-state firm (July 2023).
  • Beyond lawLead Partner of Manhattan Development Group, with communities in four states; partner in Santo Spirits with Sammy Hagar and Guy Fieri; Managing Partner of ROW 94 bourbon with Dierks Bentley. See the ventures.

The Litigation Singularity

Three forces are converging on the cost of a lawsuit.

For a century the economics of litigation have rested on one assumption: legal work is expensive because skilled human hours are scarce. That assumption is failing. Miles calls the moment it fails the Litigation Singularity, and he argues that it will reorder who sues, who settles, and who pays.

Capital

Money is no longer the constraint on bringing a claim.

Litigation finance, aggregated plaintiffs, and insurance capital have turned lawsuits into an asset class. Claims that once died for lack of funding now get filed, and filed at scale.

Artificial intelligence

The marginal cost of legal work is heading toward zero.

Review, research, drafting, and analysis that took teams of associates now take hours. When the labor that priced a dispute disappears, the price of the dispute changes with it.

Opportunity

Litigation moves from cost center to strategic variable.

Companies that understand the new economics first will settle smarter, try the right cases, and structure their exposure before the plaintiffs' bar does it for them.

The first application of the thesis is transportation. "The Freight Singularity" examines how capital and AI are reshaping trucking and logistics litigation, an industry already living with nuclear verdicts. Further industries follow.

Read the writing Book a briefing →

Books & Ideas

The book, the thesis, and the record behind both.

A memoir of building a national firm, a series of essays on where litigation goes next, and the published work that preceded them.

Coming Soon

50 States
The Business of Law and Beyond

How a regional insurance-defense firm became the first law firm in all fifty states, told by the partner who drew the map. A book about growth, risk, and the business of law, written for anyone who has to build something national out of something local.

Signed first editions. A limited run of signed, numbered copies will go to the people on this list first. One email when they are ready; nothing else.

Publisher inquiries welcome through the contact below.

Selected writing

  • The Freight Singularity ForthcomingCapital, AI, and the future of transportation litigation. First in the Singularity series.
  • PFAS Litigation: Emerging Trends PublishedReuters / Westlaw Today, November 2023, with Todd Murphy and Britanny Jocius.
  • The Future of PFAS PublishedReuters / Westlaw Today, September 2023, with Brian Ledger.
  • Litigation Leaders: On the Value of Being in All 50 States InterviewThe American Lawyer, July 2023.

Ventures

Beyond the law: places and brands built with partners worth naming.

Miles is heavily invested outside the courtroom as well, as an investor and partner. His portfolio runs from residential communities in four states, anchored by a mile of Ohio River frontage in Kentucky, to two spirits brands created with some of the most recognizable names in music and television.

Manhattan Development Group

Multi-family development across four states

Lead Partner.

An owner-operator of multi-family communities across the Midwest and Southeast, developing and managing from land acquisition through property management since 2012. The flagship is Manhattan Harbour, a master-planned riverfront district on a full mile of the Ohio River in Dayton, Kentucky, minutes from downtown Cincinnati, with luxury apartments, upscale condominiums, and mixed-use development. The portfolio extends to renovated communities in Green Bay and Oshkosh, Wisconsin, and to Abbey Glen in LaGrange, Georgia and Chapel View in St. Louis, Missouri.

Visit Manhattan Development Group

Santo Spirits

Tequila and Mezquila

Partner in the brand.

Santo Mezquila bottle

A premium agave-spirits house that began with Santo Mezquila, the first commercially available blend of tequila and mezcal, and grew into a line of Blanco, Reposado, and Añejo tequilas. Distilled in Jalisco with third-generation master distiller Juan Eduardo Nuñez and distributed nationally through Southern Glazer's Wine & Spirits.

Founders & partnersSammy HagarRock & Roll Hall of Fame inductee and Grammy-winning musician
Guy FieriEmmy-winning chef, restaurateur, and television personality
Visit Santo Spirits

ROW 94

Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey

Managing Partner.

ROW 94 Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey bottle

Launched in September 2024 with country star Dierks Bentley, a longtime friend of Miles, and made at Green River Distilling Co. in Owensboro, Kentucky. The name honors Nashville's Music Row and 1994, the year Bentley arrived there. The line now includes Broken Branches and ROW 94 Full Proof, with a national sales and marketing partnership through U.S. Beverage.

Founder & partnerDierks BentleyCountry music star and Capitol Records Nashville recording artist
Visit ROW 94

Santo, ROW 94, and Manhattan Harbour are names and marks of their respective owners. Please enjoy responsibly.

Speaking

Three talks, for the people who carry the risk.

Miles speaks to boards, general counsel, insurers, and the leaders of professional-services firms. Each talk is built from cases he tried and a firm he built, not from slides about either.

Miles Scully seated in a high-rise office
Keynotes, fireside conversations, closed-door executive briefings, and panel moderation.

The Litigation Singularity

Why capital and AI are about to change what a lawsuit costs, who brings one, and how it ends. A forward look at legal risk for the next decade, with the transportation industry as the first case study.

ForBoards and C-suites, general counsel, insurance and reinsurance executives, litigation funders

Building a Fifty-State Platform

The decisions, mistakes, and bets behind turning a regional firm into a national one, from the first out-of-state office to the fiftieth. What translates to any professional-services business trying to grow without losing itself.

ForLaw firm and professional-services leadership, partnerships, growth-stage founders

Before You Reach the Courtroom

What a trial lawyer wishes every executive understood about how cases are actually won and lost, how juries think about companies, and which decisions made years earlier decide the verdict.

ForExecutives, risk managers, in-house legal teams

Invite Miles to Speak → Topics can be tailored to an industry or a single company's exposure.

Contact

Bring the conversation to your room.

Conference organizers, executive teams, and journalists can reach Miles's office directly. Include dates, audience, and format, and you will hear back promptly.

  • Conferences & keynotesIndustry conferences, firm retreats, insurance and legal-industry events.
  • Executive briefingsPrivate sessions for boards, leadership teams, and legal departments on litigation exposure and the Singularity thesis.
  • Media & interviewsCommentary on litigation trends, law-firm growth, and the business of law.
  • PublishingInquiries about 50 States and the Singularity series.