Highlights of her recent work include representing Unified Grocers, Inc., a retailer-owned wholesale grocery distributor, in its $375 million acquisition by SUPERVALU INC. and advising J.P. Morgan Securities, financial advisor to Rockwell Collins, in Rockwell Collins’ $6.4 billion acquisition of B/E Aerospace. The transaction combined Rockwell Collins’ capabilities in flight deck avionics and mission communications with B/E Aerospace's range of cabin interior products for commercial airliners and business jets. She also advised Moelis & Company, financial adviser to the Special Committee of Oracle, in Oracle’s $9.3 billion acquisition of NetSuite, a cloud-based software service provider; and counseled FilmYard Holdings, parent company of MIRAMAX, in MIRAMAX’s acquisition by beIN MEDIA GROUP.
Alison has been widely recognized for her work. She has been named The American Lawyer’s “Dealmaker of the Week” multiple times and she is a past “Dealmaker of the Year” in The American Lawyer for her role as quarterback of the $15.2 billion sale of Barclays Global Investors to BlackRock, a transaction the publication described as the “deal of a lifetime.”
Quality Matters
But it's not the size or number of Alison's deals that clients value the most—it's the quality of her work and her leadership skills. The head of corporate legal for Barclays noted, “Alison runs her deals like a great conductor leading an orchestra.” A client, posting on The Best Lawyers in America website, praised Alison as “a dynamo. She has great technical and transaction management skills, a wealth of experience, [is] highly respected, and [sees] the forest for the trees.”
Leader at S&C
In addition to her active practice, Alison has sat on Sullivan & Cromwell's management committee since 2003—the first female and first non-New York partner to become one of the committee's ten appointees. A partner in the Firm's Los Angeles office, she also is responsible for the Firm's practice in California, as well as serving as co-head of the Firm's Private Equity Group.
Balanced Perspective
While she has tackled responsibilities that would keep any lawyer busy, Alison's commitment to work/life balance is commendable. Alison and her husband, Richard, have three daughters and a son. Alison also serves on the board of Brown University as vice chancellor and as co-chair of the Dean's Council of Columbia Law School. S&C partner Tracy Richelle High expresses the esteem in which Alison is held by S&C colleagues and friends: “She finds time for all of it. She doesn't make work or family take a back seat; she is an extraordinarily talented and respected lawyer as well as a mother. She shows through example that you do not have to choose one over the other. You can be both.”