Rowan D. Wilson is a partner in Cravath's Litigation Department.
Mr. Wilson has a broad practice in complex litigation, including antitrust and competition, intellectual property, contract, securities fraud, entertainment and media, and civil rights and employment matters.
Some of Mr. Wilson's engagements have included the representation of: Time Inc. in antitrust litigation brought by magazines wholesalers; Thai Airways in putative class-action antitrust lawsuits alleging price-fixing; Royal Dutch Shell in lawsuits brought under the Alien Tort Act; IBM in a lawsuit brought by a software company alleging Sherman Act Section 1 and 2 violations, theft of trade secrets, and copyright infringement; Westfed Holdings in a Winstar-type lawsuit against the United States for breach of contract; the National Basketball Players' Association in antitrust litigation brought by the NBA; Newport News Shipbuilding, in a Clayton Act §7 lawsuit brought by the Department of Justice to block General Dynamics' acquisition of Newport News; classes of African Americans and women in civil rights litigation against municipal employers in Alabama; Home Box Office in breach-of-contract litigation against boxer Riddick Bowe and his promoter; Time Inc. in a lawsuit brought by the Department of Labor; HBO and Time Warner Cable, in copyright infringement litigation brought by Broadcast Music Inc., which included antitrust counterclaims; the American Bar Association as amicus curiae in a lawsuit concerning the permissible scope of affirmative action; Lazard in fraud litigation in connection with its purchase of several businesses owning assisted living facilities; PricewaterhouseCoopers in several securities fraud matters; and E.ON in securities fraud litigation concerning the potential acquisition of Endesa.
Mr. Wilson has also provided antitrust and competition advice in the computer software, computer hardware, recorded music, music video, book, magazine, defense contracting, fundraising, cable television, satellite television, music licensing, alcoholic beverage, professional sports, electrical power, coal, pharmaceutical, retail grocery, household appliance, airline, office outsourcing, commercial copier/printer, medical insurance, video game, and infant formula industries.
Mr. Wilson has argued, among others, the appeals in: Westfed Holdings v. United States (Federal Circuit), affirming a judgment of over $240 million against the United States for a breach of contract claim; Liberty Cable v. City of New York (Second Circuit), a case involving the constitutionality of cable regulations promulgated by New York City; AMI v. Broadcast Music Inc. (Ninth Circuit), a case involving copyright and antitrust issues relating to music licensing; Wiwa v. Shell Petroleum Development Corporation of Nigeria and Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Shell, (Second Circuit), cases involving the scope of the Alien Tort Act; United States v. Jefferson County (Eleventh Circuit), a long-running Title VII class action seeking to guarantee nondiscriminatory hiring by governmental employers in Alabama; and Kiobel v. Millson (Second Circuit), a case involving the power of magistrate judges to issue Rule 11 sanctions. Mr. Wilson also wrote the briefs amicus curiae on behalf of the American Bar Association in Grutter v. Bollinger (United States Supreme Court and Sixth Circuit), a case involving the permissibility of the use of race as a factor in law school admissions; and the briefs and successful petition for certiorari in National Basketball Association v. Williams (United States Supreme Court and Second Circuit), a case involving the degree to which the federal labor laws displace the federal antitrust laws. He has been recognized in The Legal 500 for his appellate work.
Mr. Wilson was born in Pomona, California. He received an A.B. cum laude from Harvard College in 1981, and a J.D. cum laude from Harvard Law School in 1984, where he was a member of the Civil Rights/Civil Liberties Law Review. After graduation, Mr. Wilson served in a two-year clerkship with Hon. James R. Browning, Chief Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. He joined Cravath in 1986 and was elected a partner in 1991.