Hyun Sik Byun was promoted to special counsel of Covington & Burling LLP in Palo Alto.

Byun represents clients in technology disputes. He has experience in forums including the U.S. District Courts, the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, the U.S. International Trade Commission and state courts. He is based in Palo Alto.

Ryan Michael Buschell was promoted to special counsel of Covington & Burling LLP in San Francisco.

Buschell's practice covers civil litigation and arbitration matters and is focused on securing insurance coverage for policyholders. He is based in San Francisco.

Ken D. Kumayama was promoted to partner of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP in Palo Alto.

Kumayama's practice is focused on transactional matters in intellectual property, technology and privacy. He is based in Palo Alto.

Peter Mair was promoted to partner of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP in Los Angeles.

Mair focuses his practice on public and private real estate and corporate real estate transactions. He is based in Los Angeles.

Virginia Milstead was promoted to partner of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP in Los Angeles.

As a litigator, Milstead represents clients in commercial litigation matters. She focuses on securities and merger litigation, as well as director misconduct. She is based in Los Angeles.

Ashe Puri joined Maynard Cooper & Gale LLP as partner in Los Angeles.

Puri is a trial lawyer that focuses on patent infringement and trade secret cases throughout the country. He has tried cases involving electronics, computer systems, medical devices and consumer products. He is based in Los Angeles.

Mark D. Passin joined McPherson LLP as of counsel in Los Angeles.

Entertainment litigator Mark D. Passin has joined McPherson as of counsel. He joins the firm after 11 years at Robins Kaplan, where he served as chair of the entertainment media group.

His first day with McPherson was April 1.

"I represent primarily artists in litigations against major record companies, music publishing companies and motion picture companies in all sorts of disputes. A lot of times, they're either royalty audit disputes or profit participation disputes," said Passin. "So again in the music industry they are royalty audit cases often, or they're breach of contract cases. And in the motion picture [industry], I do a fair amount of profit participation cases. I also do a fair amount of copyright infringement work and copyright termination issues."

With 38 years of experience in the entertainment industry, Passin has represented high profile clients including Cher, The Ray Charles Foundation, Poison and Axl Rose.

According to Passin, what made him decide to move to McPherson were the similarities between his practice and founder Ed McPherson's practice and the flexibility the opportunity presented.

"Ed McPherson's practice is very similar and compatible with mine. And I thought it'd be nice to get back to a small firm, where I had more flexibility on the types of cases that I can take."

At McPherson, Passin hopes to continue with his artist-oriented practice and to continue promoting the cause of artists against the major record companies and motion picture and television studios.

For Passin, what makes his practice unique is the focus on artists.

"You know, it's very hard to find a firm that has an artist-oriented practice. Most of the firms, especially the big firms, represent the studios and the record companies."

Dino Tovar Barajas joined DLA Piper LLP as partner in Los Angeles.

Barajas joined DLA Piper's finance practice in Los Angeles, where he is co-chair of the U.S. projects and infrastructure group as well as the Latin American corporate and finance practice.

Barajas joined the firm from Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP.

Before joining DLA Piper, he led the Latin America practices at three international law firms and has received many accolades of along the way. He has been practicing for 26 years.

"My practice is pretty evenly split between U.S. and Latin America, and I do a lot of work in energy, particularly in power, but I've worked across sectors," he said.

Barajas said his mentor taught him to move with the market and anticipate trends before they become trends and to not "simply learn one instrument."

"Multitask and learn to play every instrument of the band because you never know what instrument somebody wants to hear you play and what need arises," he said. "So from that point of view, I've had a fairly eclectic practice in terms of where I've worked."

Although, his practice is mostly focused on U.S. and Latin America, Barajas' work has touched other jurisdictions, including on a deal in Yemen.

Barajas focuses on domestic and international project development and finance, specializing in Latin American infrastructure projects, debt financings and mergers and acquisitions.

His client list includes international corporations and their interests in Latin America, including lenders, investors and developers in project financing in the energy, power, infrastructure and commercial sectors.

Beyond providing legal advice, Barajas said he strives to be a business advisor and actively look for future opportunities for his clients.

When considering his move to DLA Piper after 10 years at Akin Gump, Barajas took time to ensure the move benefited his clients. "I think now the Modus Operandi for most people is they're jumping around every two or three years, and it almost looks like musical chairs. But in terms of my old platform, great platform, great people to work with, but in terms of the platform that DLA offered me and offered my clients, which I try to prioritize, was that they were everywhere at least in terms of Latin America that I needed to be."

According to Barajas, travel was his favorite part of his practice, but today it's something different.

"Thankfully, I've had the opportunity to do a lot of first-of-their-kind deals. A number of them have been recognized deals of the year and other market recognitions," he said. "So that's always kept my practice fun and interesting. You know, you never dip your toe in the same river twice, kind of thing."

Paul Skip Spaulding joined Shartsis Friese LLP as partner in San Francisco.

Spaulding has over 30 years of experience litigating and counseling clients on matters regarding environmental, natural resources and land use. He is based in San Francisco.

Kevin Leiske joined Shartsis Friese LLP as partner in San Francisco.

Previously with a firm in Austin, Leiske advises clients on all stages ofctheir operations. He handles domestic and international federal income taxation of corporations, partnerships and limited liability companies. He is based in San Francisco.

James Neudecker joined Jeffer Mangels Butler & Mitchell LLP as partner in San Francisco.

Neudecker joined Jeffer Mangels' litigation practice after 18 years at Reed Smith. His first day was
March 25.

A litigator, Neudecker said he considers himself a generalist.

"I've touched just about every area of litigation," he said. "Right now, or for the past few years, I would say probably about 80% of my litigation is commercial litigation or consumer facing litigation."

In the past, his clients have included companies such as Renovate America and FirstGroup as well as businesses that own and operate bars and restaurants along with other events in San Francisco.

Neudecker said he gave his move a great deal of thought and found Jeffer Mangels "by far and away the most appealing" option that presented itself.

"[Jeffer Mangels] really presented a truly unique opportunity. It's a large enough firm that, it's full service, and they can handle the most complex litigation yet it's a small enough, it's about 120 lawyers, where you know every person not just every lawyer, but every person on a first name basis and they have a real California focus. Their litigation capabilities are nationwide, but their offices are in San Francisco, LA and Orange County. So, it was a truly unique place in my view and a truly unique opportunity."

He anticipates his practice's focus to stay primarily the same with the move.

At Jeffer Mangels, Neudecker hopes to build his practice and do quality legal work with top notch colleagues.

"Being a generalist, you're going to work on a lot of different types of cases and a lot of different business sectors and you're constantly learning new things about new companies in different industries," he said. "There's not a lot of cutting and pasting in the business litigation work that I do. There's a lot of variety, every case is different, and it's an opportunity to learn about a lot of different things and a lot of different areas."

Alec G. Nedelman joined Katten as senior counsel in Los Angeles.

Nedelman joins the firm's west coast real estate group. Previously, Nedelman served as general counsel of structured finance at iStar Inc. and Safehold Inc. He is based in Los Angeles.

Angela Christine Agrusa was promoted to managing partner of DLA Piper in Los Angeles.

As a business litigator, Agrusa represents individuals, companies and brands in complex commercial, class action and civil cases. She is based in Los Angeles.

Dean Fealk was promoted to managing partner of DLA Piper in San Francisco.

Fealk focuses on corporate, securities, regulatory, tax, labor, foreign exchange and data privacy matters. He is based in San Francisco.

Victoria Wing-Yan Lee was promoted to managing partner of DLA Piper in Northern California & Silicon Valley.

Lee represents emerging growth and public companies in complex technology and commercial transactions. She is based in East Palo Alto.

Carrie Lynne Williamson was promoted to deputy managing partner of DLA Piper in Silicon Valley.

Williamson focuses on patent litigation including discovery, pretrial and trial matters.She is based in Silicon Valley.

Arielle O Harris as shareholder in Walnut Creek

Harris focuses on land use, environmental and natural resources law and
litigation. She is based in Walnut Creek.

Sunghak "Andy" Baik joined Mayer Brown as partner in San Francisco.

Baik has joined Mayer Brown's tax transactions and consulting practice as partner from Ernst & Young LLP. He is based in the firm's San Francisco office.
His first day was March 17.

Baik's practice is focused on advising foreign companies, primarily from Asia who are investing in the U.S., regarding U.S. tax and cross border tax matters. Additionally, he also works with U.S. and European multi-national companies, who have operations in Asia and are looking for expertise regarding cross border tax issues.

Baik said he was attracted to Mayer Brown's attributes, such as its "robust global platform" and "deep bench," which fit with his practice.

"I was driven to Mayer Brown because of the opportunity to advise, for example my Asian clients, not just on tax, but you know, related services, legal services that Mayer Brown has a lot of capabilities in."

Baik said he does not expect his focus to change with the move, but he does anticipate he'll "target a broader range of clients."

"I'm very much looking forward to continuing to serve clients with their best interest in mind, but I think the additional attraction, as I said earlier, is I'll be able to bring Mayer Brown's strength and capabilities in many legal areas to my clients."

Prior to joining Mayer Brown, Baik spent 25 years at very large accounting and audit firms. He spent nearly a dozen of those years working in Singapore and Korea, where he advised on tax matters.

For Baik, what makes his practice unique is his focus on Asia-U.S. cross border matters.

"I think a lot of U.S. companies when they're investing in Asia have the additional challenge of navigating through differences in culture, norms and legal system. The environment may be very different from the U.S. so that makes it often challenging for a lot of U.S. companies. So the ability to provide tailored guidance based on experience and expertise in this area, many clients find it valuable."