Cleary Gottlieb Takes On Nortel and Apex Bankruptcy Filings

From: The American Lawyer, January 15, 2009

Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton picked  picked up two major bankruptcy assignments on Wednesday when the firm was formally retained by Toronto-based Nortel Networks and Cayman Islands-based Apex Silver Mines Limited.   Leading the firm’s engagement on both matters is New York-based bankruptcy and restructuring partner James Bromley. Bromley was previously part of a team from the firm that advised the SEC and Federal Reserve Bank of New York during the collapse of Lehman Brothers.   Bromley was reported in December to be leading a Cleary team advising Nortel in its restructuring efforts. Once Canada’s largest company by market value, Nortel is one of the largest manufacturers of telecommunications equipment in North America. But the company has been hit hard since the tech bubble burst in 2000.

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Our bankruptcy attorney contacts tell us they expect these cases will result in significant document reviews.  Cleary uses a number of staffing agencies and e-discovery companies.  For those of you who have worked Cleary doc reviews you might want to check with your respective agencies and see if they have any “leads”.  At this point, we don’t have any information on whom Cleary might use.

NOTE:  many of the D.C. and NYC law firms we chat with tell us most agencies are telling them “we are assembling rosters of attorneys, JD’s, paralegals and support staff with experience and expertise with bankruptcy/subprime/bailout related issues such as mortgage Litigation, foreclosure litigation, credit market related securities litigation,  bankruptcy/restructuring, etc.”

If you have any of this experience, and have not done so, you might want to create a resume emphasising this experience and start promoting yourself with your agencies.  At a recent Association of Corporate Counsel function we attended it was taken as fact that despite a move to do more document review in-house, the surge of corporate bankruptcies would cause corporations to use BigLaw for the normal large scale bankruptcy document reviews.