James C. Freund

James Freund is a retired partner of Skadden, Arps (presently of counsel to the firm).  During his 30 years of active practice with the firm, Mr. Freund’s primary focus was on representing clients in mergers and acquisition.  Since retirement, his main professional activity has been in the field of dispute resolution, serving as a mediator and, in some cases, an arbitrator of commercial disputes.

Mr. Freund’s M&A experience was both in the negotiated and contested areas.  He represented corporations such as Dun & Bradstreet in its acquisition programs, and companies such as Neutrogena, E.F. Hutton, and several large regional banks when they were acquired.  In the 1980s, Mr. Freund defended Trans World Airlines Inc. and Federated Department stores against hostile takeovers.  His books, Anatomy of a Merger and The Acquisition Mating Dance, and his numerous articles were widely read, and for 20 years until his retirement, he was the founder and chairman of New York Law Journal’s Annual Seminar on “Negotiated Acquisitions — Public and Private.”

Mr. Freund’s primary activity in the field of negotiated dispute resolution has been acting as a mediator in a number of significant commercial cases.  In addition to his book, Smart Negotiating: How to Make Good Deals in the Real World (Simon & Schuster, 1992), he has written and lectured extensively in the field of mediation, including authoring the article, “The Neutral Negotiator: Why and How Mediation Can Work to Resolve Dollar Disputes,” which was awarded the 1994 First Prize for Professional Articles by the CPR Institute for Dispute Resolution.

On the educational front, Mr. Freund taught negotiating as an adjunct professor at Fordham University School of Law for many years; served as chairman and participated in numerous professional seminars; and wrote, narrated and dramatized videotapes on negotiating, lawyering and acquisition topics, including a six-hour Practising Law Institute video course entitled “Smart Negotiating for Lawyers.”  He also wrote the books, Lawyering – A Realistic Approach to Legal Practice, Advise and Invent — The Lawyer as Counselor–Strategist and other Essays, Legal–Ease — Fresh Insights into Lawyering, and in 2008, Smell Test — Stories and Advice on Lawyering, published by the American Bar Association.