Michelman & Robinson, LLP (“M&R”) is pleased to announce and commemorate the twentieth anniversary of its founding on June 1, 1999.

M&R is a leading midsize law firm known for its powerhouse litigation, transactional and regulatory teams that represent a who’s who of clients in the advertising & digital media, banking & finance, entertainment, hospitality, insurance, retail & apparel and technology spaces, among many others. The firm’s lawyers do so out of headquarters in Los Angeles, offices in Irvine, San Francisco and Chicago and its anchor in New York City.

Over two decades, M&R has realized measured, yet explosive growth, and with that have come tremendous accolades. A small sampling – M&R has been designated a “Best Place to Work” multiple times; its earned repeated recognition by The Legal 500; U.S. News & World Report has given the firm’s commercial litigation practice group a Tier 1 ranking; Vault has called it one of the best known and most sought-after midsize law firms in the nation; the Los Angeles Business Journal included M&R in its Top 100 Southern California law firms; and Law360 honored its commitment to minority lawyers.

The recognition comes on the heels of remarkable successes over the years. M&R lawyers have made (and changed) law; have shielded clients from billions of dollars of exposure; have won multi-million dollar verdicts; have closed deal after significant deal; and have otherwise left their mark in the courtroom, in the boardroom and in the lives of the people who’ve counted on us time and time again.

Sanford Michelman, the firm’s co-founder is thrilled to celebrate the milestone. He says, “By nature, I’m rather forward-thinking, but to look back 20 years and remember the day Mark and I launched M&R is really something. We started out with big ideas, ambitious goals and an approach to law and business that was different from the rest, but not much else. Fast forward, and we’ve become a hard hitting, national firm known for our tenacity and unmatched client service excellence – that’s a lot to be proud of.”

What co-founder Mark Robinson is most gratified by is M&R’s work product, “we know our clients’ businesses from A to Z and what it is they want to achieve, and that’s entirely reflected in our work and remarkable track record of wins over the past two decades.”

Adds Dana Kravetz, M&R’s firm managing partner for the last 10 years and Chair of its Hospitality Industry Group, “It’s a great feeling of accomplishment to reflect back on 20 years of growth and successes, but what I’m most excited about are the opportunities to come. In my view, our nuanced understanding of client industries and uncompromising attention to detail means that the sky continues to be the limit for M&R and the extraordinary folks that work here.”

About Michelman & Robinson, LLP

M&R, a national law firm with offices in California, Illinois and New York, represents clients in complex litigation, transactional and regulatory matters in a wide variety of practice areas and industries, including Advertising & Digital Media, Banking & Financial Services, Commercial Litigation, Corporate & Securities, Entertainment, Hospitality, Insurance, Intellectual Property, Labor & Employment, Real Estate, Retail and Apparel and Tax. For more information, please visit www.mrllp.com.

Dana Kravetz has recently been named a member of the Law360 Hospitality Editorial Advisory Board. In that capacity, Dana will provide substantive feedback on how Law360 can continue to generate stellar hospitality-related content, and he will share sources when possible.

Law360, a subscription-based, legal news service operated by the Portfolio Media Company (a subsidiary of LexisNexis), covers nearly every major industry, and helps legal practitioners stay on top of legal precedent in a broad range of practice areas and corporate sectors.

Congratulations, Dana, for this prestigious appointment and recognition.

Please join us this May for the M&R Insurance Hot Topics! This event is a morning program of four focused panels with a luncheon to follow. The four panels will cover trending topics in the insurance industry such as cybersecurity, acquisitions, compliance and more. Accompanying M&R attorneys on the panels will be senior professionals in Private Equity and Insurance.

By attending the education-based program attendees will avail themselves to a broad-based curriculum directly impacting the insurance industry. The panel discussions offered will be an excellent source of continuing education for those insurance professionals in attendance, particularly given the timeliness and relevance of the areas of focus.

The event will be held in Los Angeles on May 10 from 7:30 AM – 1:30 PM, at the Luxe Hotel (Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles) and in New York on May 17 from 8:00 AM – 2:00 PM, at the W Hotel (Union Square, New York).

For more information click here.

 

MediaLink, a leading strategic business advisory and development company, recently sold to UK-based Ascential plc, an international business-to-business media firm that informs and connects business professionals in more than 150 countries through market-leading exhibitions and festivals and information services. The transaction may be valued at more than $200 million.

Serving the media, marketing, advertising, entertainment, technology and finance industries, MediaLink’s international clientele ranges from Fortune 100 brands to startups and includes such well-known companies as AT&T, Microsoft, Fox and Comcast, to name a few. For its part, Ascential plc, which is listed on the London Stock Exchange, adds MediaLink to a growing roster of assets, Money 20/20 (the UK’s largest trade show), the prestigious Cannes Lions festival for the branded communications industry, EMAP (a content and subscriptions business) and fashion-trend forecaster WSGN among them.

Pending U.S. regulatory approvals, MediaLink will form part of Ascential’s Information Services division.

Los Angeles-based law firm Michelman & Robinson, LLP (M&R) represented MediaLink in the sale, led by Ronald Camhi, who helped launch MediaLink in 2003 and advised it through more than a decade of tremendous growth. Mr. Camhi’s team included M&R’s co-founder Sanford Michelman (L.A.), Ryan Hong (L.A.), Ian Shane (NY), Michael Hatchett (NY), Celina Kirchner (L.A.) and Matthew Lasky (L.A.).

Michael Kassan, MediaLink’s Chairman, CEO and founder, said of the sale, “this was a significant transaction that will allow us to take our proven business model to the next level with geographic growth alongside Ascential.” He went on to praise MediaLink’s long-time counsel, “We were so fortunate to have Michelman & Robinson at our side. They know the media space, its nuances, and how to navigate complicated deals.”

Mr. Camhi, head of M&R’s Media Practice Group stated, “I’ve handled many media transactions, but this one was particularly enjoyable because of the novel issues and fantastic people involved – on both sides of the table.” And given the history between MediaLink and M&R, Mr. Michelman added, “it speaks volumes about M&R that Michael, MediaLink’s founder, sought us out to represent the sale of his baby. I’m very proud of our team.”

Mark Zafrin and Mark Frimmel were mentioned in Senior Care Investor’s article, “Upper East Side SNF Sells Big,” for closing a leveraged buyout of a 499 Bed Nursing Home in Manhattan (Dewitt Rehab) for $108,000,000.00, including a $90,000,000.00 bridge to HUD from Key Bank.

Read more here: http://seniorcare.levinassociates.com/2015/07/upper-east-side-snf-sells-big/

Sanford Michelman was recently named to the Insurance Industry Charitable Foundation’s Western division board. Read more about the appointment in the Insurance Journal:

 Text from the Announcement:

Michelman, Morrison and Taylor will assist the Western division board in managing the division’s grant focus areas, grant guidelines, events and volunteer activities. The board oversees the organization’s operation in Los Angeles and throughout California, where the division is headquartered, as well as in IICF’s Colorado and Arizona chapters.

After outgrowing its offices in Encino, Michelman & Robinson has moved into a much larger space in Westwood. The law firm now occupies the 19th floor of the Oppenheimer Tower at 10880 Wilshire Blvd., which offers about 15,000 more square feet than its former Encino space, said Sanford Michelman, the firm’s co-founder and chairman.

But Michelman said the move, finalized last month, is also poised to help recruit more attorneys to the firm. “Some people have an adverse reaction to the (San Fernando) Valley,” he said. “I don’t really understand it, but some do. This just removes that issue.”

The firm – which had 34 attorneys in Los Angeles County in March, according to Business Journal data – is growing quickly, Michelman said. Roughly 20 more lawyers are slated to join the firm within the next six months or so. Health care, hospitality, insurance, advertising and digital media lawyers are in highest demand at the firm, he added, noting that the trend is likely to continue. Michelman said his firm will have to lease additional space in the Oppenheimer Tower within the next two years or so because of its rapidly growing headcount.

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