Fox’s legal bench is in demand. A day after Fox announced its own GC handoff, Authentic Brands Group named Clément Smadja chief legal officer. At Fox he was a senior vice president handling M&A, corporate finance, SEC compliance and governance, and worked on the spinoff and the proposed Roku deal, valued at roughly $22 billion. Before that, he was a Kirkland & Ellis partner.
He reports to CEO Matt Maddox and succeeds Jay Dubiner, CLO since 2015, who becomes executive vice chairman focused on big transactions. Authentic owns Reebok, Champion, Sports Illustrated and Elvis Presley, among 50-plus brands. Public company deal chops plus a Biglaw pedigree remains a strong recipe for becoming a general counsel. Plenty of General Counsel jobs want that mix.
“Smadja succeeds Jay Dubiner, who has served as Authentic’s Chief Legal Officer since 2015 and was instrumental in building Authentic into the global brand and entertainment platform it is today.”
Read: Authentic Brands Group Appoints Clément Smadja as Chief Legal Officer at PR Newswire (Authentic Brands Group)