Dreier Taps Newman to Lead Biz Development

SANTA MONICA, CA-Nancy Newman has been tapped as national director of business development for Dreier Stein & Kahan LLP. The move comes at an integral time for the firm as its plans a merger with Beverly Hills-based Browne Woods & George LLP.

The merger will take place as of January 1, 2008 and signals a continuing growth pattern for Dreier, which was founded this past January. The firm is based in Santa Monica and Century City.

The new firm will be known as Dreier Stein Kahan Browne Woods & George LLP and combines Dreier’s 54-attorney entertainment litigation and corporate transactional focus with Browne’s 17-attorney business litigation and trial firm. The new operation will be the west coast affiliate of 125-attorney New York-based Dreier LLP and will be located in the Santa Monica and Century City offices.

As for Newman, her experience is “in marketing and business development at national law firms (and that) fits in with our philosophy of providing our clients with the expertise they expect from the large law firms combined with the responsive service they receive from a smaller firm,” says Larry Stein, co-founder of Dreier Stein & Kahan LLP and head of the Entertainment and Media Department.

Prior to joining Dreier, Newman served as director of client relations, West Coast, for Goodwin Procter LLP. Previously, she had been marketing director for the real estate and public finance practices at Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP and Cox, Castle Nicholson LLP.

Already, since coming on board at Dreier, she has begun raising the real estate profile of the firm. One of the attorneys, Judy Lam, has been named as one of the most influential women in real estate in the current issue of Real Estate Southern California, which, along with Globest.com, and other print and online publications, is a part of Real Estate Media.