Joele Frank advised on 80 shareholder-activism defense assignments in 2025, more than twice the total of any rival firm, according to Bloomberg’s full-year league tables for IR/PR advisers. The firm finished first both globally and in the United States, where 78 of those 80 mandates originated.
The size of the gap stands out. FGS Global placed second with 31 defense assignments, followed by Collected Strategies at 20, Brunswick Group at 19, and ICR at 18. No competitor reached half of Joele Frank’s count.
This result extended a streak. Joele Frank has topped Bloomberg’s activism table for IR/PR advisers for seven years running and has held the No. 1 ranking for shareholder-activism defense since 2019.
A record year for activists set the backdrop
Activist investors launched 255 campaigns worldwide over the year, the most on record, surpassing the prior peak set in 2018, according to Lazard’s Annual Review of Shareholder Activism. North American targets absorbed 173 of those campaigns, a 28% jump from 2024.
Barclays tracked the same surge and tied it to a stronger market for deals and looser financing conditions that gave activists room to push. Board seats remained the most common demand, and mergers featured in roughly a third of campaign objectives, a share above the five-year average.
More campaigns meant more boards looking for advisers who handle the communications side of a proxy fight. Joele Frank captured the largest piece of that demand.
What a defense mandate involves
A defense assignment runs well beyond drafting a press release. When an activist discloses a stake and a slate of demands, the targeted company’s advisers shape the public response, prepare directors and executives for investor questions, coordinate with proxy solicitors and legal counsel, and build the argument shareholders weigh before a vote.
Joele Frank represents the company-side only, and never the activists pressing them. For a board deciding whom to hire during a contested campaign, not having to worry about a potential conflict or even a prior relationship with an activist can provides boards and management teams with additional peace of mind.
Founder Joele Frank has built a personal record in the category that few advisers, if any, can match. Across her career she has gone up against Starboard Value more than 40 times, Carl Icahn more than 30, and Pershing Square more than 10, according to the firm. Those fights include Target’s defense against Pershing Square and Clorox’s against Carl Icahn.
First on both counts
Activism is not the only area where JF has firmly established itself as an industry leader. On mergers and acquisitions, Joele Frank ranked first once again. The Deal’s full-year league table named it the top financial communications adviser in U.S. M&A, the position the firm has held since 2013.
The firm advised on both contested and friendly transactions across the year, including the target’s side of the largest deal of 2025, Union Pacific’s $88 billion acquisition of Norfolk Southern.
The pattern points to one firm leading on both fronts at once. Joele Frank finished first on The Deal’s M&A communications table and first on Bloomberg’s activism defense table in the same year. The activism lead is the wider of the two, a margin its competitors have not closed in seven years.
Whether the lead holds depends partly on the activists themselves. If 2025’s campaign volume carries into 2026, the supply of contested situations that built Joele Frank’s franchise will keep flowing.
