Cooley is expanding its compensation and benefits practice with the addition of partner Barbara Mirza. Mirza joins Cooley from Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP where she practiced for a total of 12 years in the firm’s New York and Los Angeles offices. Mirza also spent four years as a senior executive compensation and benefits advisor in the Los Angeles office of Ernst & Young LLP. She will reside in the firm’s Los Angeles office and support the compensation and benefits needs of clients in the US and internationally.

Mirza’s practice focuses primarily on senior-level executive compensation matters with an emphasis on corporate transactions and ongoing executive compensation work. She has worked with clients ranging from startups to multinationals across multiple industries, and she has extensive experience advising both public and private companies. Mirza has deep experience handling the compensation and benefits aspects of mergers and acquisitions ranging in size from less than $100 million to more than $7 billion.

“Barbara’s addition gives Cooley’s client base additional heft in this critically important practice area,” said Fred Muto, chair of Cooley’s business department. “Her impressive compensation and benefits background advising numerous major global corporations further deepens Cooley’s impressive capabilities in this area and enhances our ability to support the record levels of activity across our public companies, M&A and capital markets practices.”

“Cooley is on an incredible growth trajectory across the United States and globally,” Mirza said. “It’s a great moment to join such a vibrant team and become part of a firm that is recognized around the world for the superb quality of its work and a culture of teamwork and mutual support.”

Mirza graduated from Queen’s University in Kingston, Canada with a BA in philosophy with first class honors and received her LLB from the University of Toronto Faculty of Law, where she was co-editor in chief of the law review.

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