Joe Sims, retired Jones Day partner and antitrust pioneer, endows Sims Chair at the Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law at ASU
Joe Sims, who led Jones Day's Antitrust & Competition Law Practice to national and global prominence during nearly 40 years at the Firm, has endowed a new chair at his alma mater, the Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law at Arizona State University: The Sims Chair in Competition Law and Regulation at ASU Law.
David Gelfand, one of the country's leading antitrust lawyers and senior counsel at Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP, has been named the Sims Chair and professor of practice at ASU Law. The university announced Mr. Gelfand's appointment and its expanding antitrust program at a virtual event on Wednesday, February 23.
"I am extremely pleased that someone with Dave's experience will be the first person to hold the Sims Chair," said Mr. Sims, who was in the first graduating class of ASU's law school in 1970. "Dave is an exceptional practitioner and a person with both the intellectual ability and the character that you would want to have hold a position your name is attached to."
"With his leadership and ASU Law's expanding antitrust program, we hope to play an important role in the ongoing debate about the future of antitrust policy in the 21st century. Antitrust is the subject of intense debate at the moment, and our goal is for Dave and his ASU Law team to help shape this debate and any resulting changes toward common-sense, practical, and effective competition law and regulation in the future," said Sims.
"I couldn’t be more excited about this position," said Mr. Gelfand, who has more than 30 years of experience in private practice and as a government lawyer. "Joe is someone I've known professionally and looked up to for a long time. He is among a very small group of truly excellent and very important antitrust practitioners. I've often asked myself, 'What would Joe do in this situation?' I hope others will join Joe and me and ASU Law in this venture, to come and guest lecture and teach and help us think through these complex issues."
After serving in the U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division for eight years, Mr. Sims joined Jones Day in 1978. Over the next four decades, he helped lead the Firm's Antitrust & Competition Law Practice to prominence not only in the U.S., but also in Europe and Asia. When The National Law Journal named Sims an "M&A and Antitrust Trailblazer" in 2015, it said, "no lawyer in modern times has had more impact on the antitrust agencies' relationship with the private bar."
Throughout his career as one of the nation's preeminent antitrust lawyers, Sims was well known for representing major companies in complex, high-visibility transactions, including American Airlines' merger with US Airways, AOL's merger with Time Warner, CBS's combination with Viacom, DIRECTV's acquisition by AT&T, Nextel's merger with Sprint, Texas Instruments' acquisition of National Semiconductor, and XM Satellite Radio's merger with Sirius. Sims was twice named The American Lawyer's "Dealmaker of the Year"—for the XM/Sirius deal and the AOL/Time Warner merger, at the time the largest corporate merger in history.
Mr. Sims also played a significant role in recruiting more than 150 lawyers to Jones Day's Antitrust Practice, many of whom are with the Firm today.
"In addition to being a great lawyer, Joe was a superb colleague and mentor," said Craig Waldman, global co-head of Jones Day's Antitrust & Competition Law Practice. "Every day, we strive to meet the high standards Joe set in the Firm's antitrust practice."
"I know," Waldman added, "that it means a great deal to Joe to be able to establish the Sims Chair, and Dave is just the perfect choice for the position. I'm confident that Joe's involvement and Dave's leadership will benefit not only ASU's law students but the antitrust community as a whole."
Read ASU Law's press release: Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law at ASU hires David Gelfand to head antitrust program
In this JONES DAY TALKS® podcast, listen to Messrs. Sims and Gelfand discuss the Chair, the current state of U. S. antitrust and competition law, and their plans for ASU Law's antitrust program:
