As the head of tech giant Facebook Inc.'s international litigation team, Sharma oversees active litigations in 85 countries.
"They include most every concern imaginable in the internet space," Sharma said. "Protecting free speech, privacy and defamation issues, sensitive hate speech issues, especially during the refugee crisis, and data protection... and we put a lot of effort towards protecting minors on the internet."
He designed and oversees a global team of about 150 lawyers and other employees through the White & Case network.
Two countries he finds interesting and yet challenging at the moment are Israel and Brazil.
"Israel is one of the few jurisdictions outside the United States that has an advanced class action system," Sharma said. "This results in substantially more litigation exposure for our clients. It presents unique challenges."
He said Brazil is by far the most consumer-friendly legal environment in the world. "It's easy and cheap for consumers to file lawsuits. As a result, it creates a massive volume of litigation," Sharma said. When Sharma's clients see litigation in the same issue over multiple jurisdictions — though it is not binding authority to use an order from another region — courts do tend to be mindful of those results. "It helps achieve victory for the client in a uniform way," Sharma said. Part of their effort is taking "lessons learned in German litigation and then using those lessons in litigation that hits in France involving same issue."
Sharma also maintains a traditional U.S. litigation practice.
His largest California project is defending 12 separate litigation matters for clients SunCal Management LLC and Argent Management LLC. These cases stem from the 2008 bankruptcy of SunCal's financial partner, Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. A lot of what they entail are claims of alleged fraudulent conveyances and breach of contract. In re Palmdale Hills Property LLC, 8:12cv1805 (Bankr. C.D. Cal., filed Oct. 17, 2012).
"We've already had 15 summary judgment motions," Sharma said. "The cases are very active and will remain active through 2019, 2020. These are the kinds of cases that I think never should have been filed, but because they were, I'll now do everything to defend and protect my clients."
— Renee Flannery
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