Wednesday, November 29, 2006
Page 4
Brian Pass Joins Sheppard Mullin, Levene Neale Adds Associates
By a MetNews Staff Writer
Former Brown Raysman attorney Brian Pass has joined the Century City office of Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton as a partner in the entertainment, media and communications and the intellectual property practice groups.
“Brown Raysman is going through a merger with Thelen Reid, and I was interested in joining a firm with a more sophisticated California practice in entertainment, media and intellectual property,” Pass told the MetNews Monday.
Pass had led Brown Raysman’s West Coast technology, media and communications practice. He said senior associate Kevin Straw is making the move with him, and noted that there have been some recent departures from Brown Raysman’s Century City office.
Guy Halgren, Sheppard Mullin’s chairman, said in a release:
“Brian is a strategic addition to the firm. He will play a key role in the expansion of our technology capabilities, with a practice that straddles the firm’s entertainment, corporate and IP groups.”
Pass, whose first day at Sheppard Mullin was Nov. 20, said he hadn’t had any prior experience with the firm, and knew it only by reputation.
He said that he will bring his clients, such as Yahoo, with him. He focuses his practice on high technology and corporate law and represents technology, entertainment and media clients in the licensing, development and distribution of computer software, web-based services and applications, hardware development and OEM relationships, new media and web site licensing, development and marketing, intellectual property and trade secret protection, broadband communications, interactive television and e-commerce.
Pass also counsels early-stage and emerging growth companies in start-up formation, joint ventures, as well as mergers and acquisitions. He also advises companies on Internet privacy and other regulatory issues affecting new media and e-commerce.
Since 2001, Pass has closed over $2 billion in technology transactions, Sheppard Mullin said in a release. Representative work includes: negotiation of numerous affiliation agreements on behalf of a leading Internet search portal outside counsel to a leading manufacturer of third-party video game accessories outside counsel to a joint venture formed to develop and deliver video on demand and interactive services negotiation of a multi-million dollar e-commerce co-marketing agreement outside counsel to a leading Internet-based music discovery service and negotiation of numerous multi-million dollar enterprise license and Web services transactions in the entertainment, healthcare and fashion industries.
Prior to joining Brown Raysman, Pass co-founded Passport New Media, and served as its president and chief executive, leading the development of Passport’s children’s Internet service, Your Own World. At Passport, he raised $7.5 million in venture capital, while concluding numerous third-party content partnerships and negotiating key technology and distribution relationships.
Before forming Passport, he served as vice president and general counsel at Americast, a joint venture of The Walt Disney Corporation and several of the Baby Bell telephone companies, to develop interactive digital television services.
Pass received his law degree from UCLA School of Law in 1991, and graduated, with high honors, from Wesleyan University with a bachelor’s degree in 1986. In 2006, Pass was named by Chambers USA as one of the Leading Lawyers for Business in the IT and IT Outsourcing field in California.
Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton was founded in 1927 and has 490 attorneys in nine offices located throughout California and in New York and Washington, D.C. The firm’s California offices are located in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Santa Barbara, Century City, Orange County, Del Mar Heights and San Diego.
Tania M. Moyron and Kenrick W. Young have joined Century City’s Levene, Neale, Bender, Rankin & Brill as associates, a firm spokesperson said.
A native of La Paz, Mexico, Moyron served as trial law clerk and appellate law clerk to Bankruptcy Judge Christopher M. Klein of the Eastern District of California. Klein is also a member of the Ninth Circuit Bankruptcy Appellate Panel.
Prior to her legal career, Moryon was an associate editor at Transworld magazine in Oceanside. She received her law degree from the University of the Pacific’s McGeorge School of Law, and her undergraduate degree from UC San Diego.
Young clerked for Bankruptcy Judge Whitney Rimel of the Eastern District of California after graduating from UC Davis School of Law in 2004.
Before attending law school, he was a sales and technical representative for an industrial and commercial chemical company. He received a bachelor of science degree in biochemistry from Biola University in La Mirada.
Founded in 1995, 17-member Levene, Neale, Bender, Rankin & Brill specializes in bankruptcy, insolvency, business reorganization and related commercial litigation.
Copyright 2006, Metropolitan News Company