
Profile
Paul Sarker represents clients ranging from established industry leaders to emerging players across a wide spectrum of practice areas within entertainment, sports, and media. His representative experience includes mergers and acquisitions, television affiliation and retransmission consent agreements, content licensing, business affairs, television production, music, copyright, recording agreements, sponsorships, rights acquisitions, guild, and union matters.
Paul has broad in-house and law firm experience negotiating, structuring, and drafting agreements. His unique experience gained from working at a large media company provides him with a practical, business-minded perspective in addition to his legal training. Paul is committed to leveraging his skills and knowledge to identify opportunities to create value for his clients as well as anticipate and minimize risks and preserve client control in the rapidly-evolving industry.
Paul provides legal service tailored to his client’s specific goals, timing, and needs, to swiftly and effectively evaluate alternative approaches and make informed decisions. Paul leverages his interdisciplinary skill-set across several industries within entertainment (music, new media, television, and distribution) to craft unique strategies and compromises to novel problems.
Paul is passionate about protecting the environment and is a member of Harlem Grown and the Greenberg Traurig Green Team.
Concentrations
- Television distribution agreements including cable, retransmission consent, and emerging technologies such as OTT and authenticated distribution.
- Corporate media transactions such as mergers, acquisitions, and divestures
- Intellectual property creation and monetization
- Recording, soundtrack, composer, and performance agreements
- Talent representation
- Digital media licensing (podcasts, music services, SVOD) and business affairs
- Media audits
- Esports and gaming
Capabilities
Experience
- Advising large media networks in their evaluation of, bids for and ultimately, the purchases of other large media companies.
- Representing funds in their acquisition of media assets including valuation and navigating regulatory approval.
- Advising professional sports teams in their corporate transactions and distribution agreements.
- Drafting and negotiating affiliation agreements for independent networks and retransmission consent agreements for broadcast stations.
- Conducting both internal and external MFN audits for both independent networks and large network groups.
- Drafting content licenses, composer agreements, soundtrack agreements, performing rights organization licenses for digital subscription platforms.
- Associate Principal Counsel, Business and Legal Affairs, Marvel Entertainment & Marvel Studios, 2009-2015
Recognition & Leadership
- Team Member, a Law360 “Media & Entertainment Practice Group of the Year,” 2022
- Vice President-Sponsorship, South Asian Bar Association New York
- Member, Young Professionals Board, Harlem Grown
Credentials
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J.D., cum laude, New York University School of Law, 2009
- Senior Staff Editor, Environmental Law Journal
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B.S., Duke University, 2006
- Founder and President, The Duke Entrepreneur
- Robertson Scholar
- New York
- California