Practice Areas
Law Practice
With thirty years of general corporate and commercial experience, Mr. Certilman has been engaged in matters across a wide range of areas including corporate transactions, lending transactions, private investments and divestitures; conducting due diligence inquiries; drafting and negotiating a full range of general corporate, corporate finance and business operational and joint venture agreements with both domestic and international application such as marketing, trademark and copyright licensing, computer software development and licensing, commercial litigation, arbitration and regulatory review cases from inception through trial and real estate.
Mr. Certilman has had diverse experience in the technology law and intellectual property areas. Significant projects have included representation of vendors and clients in more than 200 computer services and business process outsourcing transactions; drafting and negotiation of agreements including software, content and technology development agreements, licenses and distribution agreements, website development and hosting agreements, online publishing agreements and consulting agreements; legal review and assistance preparing and responding to IT services RFP’s; prosecution of domain name disputes; and general representation of a wide variety of IT and technology businesses. Transactions have included engagements for IT department outsourcing from 10 to 19,000 seats, desktop and network migrations, technology refreshments, general acquisition and asset management services, desktop and network maintenance services, help desk and call center services, enterprise software licensing, and professional consulting services.
ADR Practice
Mr. Certilman began his practice as a domestic and international arbitrator in 1988 upon joining the Commercial Roster of Neutrals of the American Arbitration Association. He remains a member of its Panel of Neutrals as well as its Roster of Mediators. Through the AAA, other ADR administering organizations and on an ad hoc basis, he hears cases under the rules of various domestic and international arbitral bodies and the laws of various nations in a wide range of legal areas including IT, technology and outsourcing, IP and licensing, telecommunications, publishing, marketing and manufacturing disputes, corporate transactions and finance, investor and investment disputes, franchises, real estate, employment, construction, securities and torts. Mr. Certilman is a Chartered Arbitrator and Fellow of The Chartered Institute of Arbitrators as well as a member of major arbitration panels worldwide including the International Institute for Conflict Prevention and Resolution, the Hong Kong International Arbitration Centre, The Chartered Institute of Arbitrators, the Registry of Arbitrators and Mediators of the American Intellectual Property Law Association and International Panel of Arbitrators of the Singapore International Arbitration Centre.
Service as an arbitrator is a privilege and responsibility which Mr. Certilman treats with the utmost respect. In his service as a sole arbitrator, panel member and panel chair, Mr. Certilman remains highly aware of the reasons why parties choose arbitration and he devotes care and attention to the traditional arbitration values of speed, cost-efficiency and quality. He works with the parties to design and manage a disclosure process which is appropriate to the case. He is an expert in process management techniques, regularly serving as a trainer and presenter in arbitration law and skills programs and is highly focused on using process management techniques to achieve a balanced, fair and efficient resolution process. Mr. Certilman is committed to accepting cases only when he is available to schedule the matter without delay and give it his full attention.
Mr. Certilman is an invited member of the College of Commercial Arbitrators and an Adjunct Professor of Law at Fordham University School of Law, teaching a course on International Arbitration. He served as one of twelve elected trustees of The Chartered Institute of Arbitrators from 2005 to 2011. In 2008, he was honored by being elected to serve as chairman of the Board of Trustees, a position he was re-elected to the following year. On behalf of the Institute, he was an observer at the 2010 UNCITRAL Working Group II Sessions in New York. He is a member of the ADR Section of the American Bar Association, a member of the ADR Section of the New York State Bar Association, a member of the Executive Committee of the ADR Section of the Connecticut Bar Association, the chair of the Technology Section of the Connecticut Bar Association and a former chair of the ADR Committee of the Fairfield County Bar Association. Mr. Certilman is a frequent lecturer and author on ADR topics and a trainer in international and domestic arbitration programs.
In the mediation field, Mr. Certilman has enjoyed a high success rate with the help of a cross-section of training programs offered by various organizations. He is an active member of the panel of mediators of the American Arbitration Association, the International Institute for Conflict Prevention and Resolution (CPR), the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York and other organizations and typically serves in mediations cases involving legal areas such as transactional, corporate and commercial law, IP licensing, IT and technology law.