Daniel B. Asimow

Asimow's practice as a partner at Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer LLP focuses on representing companies in antitrust and other complex disputes.

Bay Area sports teams have retained him. In 2015, he successfully defended the Golden State Warriors after they were sued for allegedly monopolizing the market for secondary ticketing services. Asimow won a dismissal. In April 2020, he again obtained a dismissal, this time for the Oakland Raiders, in an antitrust suit filed by the City of Oakland over the team's move to Las Vegas.

The suit names the Raiders, the National Football League and all 31 other teams in the NFL and alleges violations of the Sherman Act, breach of the contract that is the NFL's relocation policy, and unjust enrichment. City of Oakland v. Oakland Raiders et al., 18-cv-07444 (N.D. Cal., filed Dec. 11, 2018).

"Sports antitrust cases are interesting because the teams are competitors but they must also cooperate to put on games," Asimow said. "It's an area we've focused on increasingly at the firm."

On April 17, Chief Magistrate Judge Joseph C. Spero of San Francisco held oral argument by videoconference on the Raiders' dismissal motion. The plaintiffs' claim, which Spero later called "unorthodox," boiled down to the contention that if the NFL had more teams, there would be less competition among cities for franchises.

Asimow described the litigation as "a political case in search of an antitrust theory." Spero ruled in his clients' favor two weeks later. "[I]t does not appear that Oakland actually objects to the limited number of teams in the NFL," he wrote. "Instead, it would seem that Oakland simply wishes it could have kept one of those teams for itself, and benefited from the prestige and economic windfall that derive from that scarcity, without paying the supracompetitive price that also arises from it."

"Argument by Zoom went surprisingly well," Asimow said. "I wonder whether the courts will keep doing it this way even after they reopen." Oakland has said it will appeal the dismissal.

In a $114 million claim that client Bayer AG cornered the market for the tick-and-flea repellent Advantix, Asimow is currently facing an unusual demand by the plaintiff: let us serve Arnold & Porter with the complaint rather than the German defendant, because Covid-19 precautions have prevented service abroad.

Asimow noted in court papers in late May that the plaintiff filed the case almost a year ago and should not be allowed to circumvent Hague Convention rules on service of legal process. Tevra Brands LLC v. Bayer Healthcare LLC, 5:19-cv-04312 (N.D. Cal., filed July 26, 2019). A hearing on the question is set for August.

-- John Roemer