Chinese law firm Alpha & Leader has set up shop in Los Angeles.

The new outpost is a sign of the increasing amount of legal activity resulting from trade between China and the United States.

More than a dozen large American law firms have offices in China, including L.A.-based Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton LLP and Latham & Watkins LLP. There are more than 150 foreign law firms with an office in China. And while far fewer Chinese law firms have come to the United States, Alpha & Leader is not the first to set up shop in America. For example, China’s King & Wood has had an office in San Francisco since 2001.

Alpha & Leader has itself had a presence, of sorts, in America since 2003 with an affiliated law firm called the USA China Law Group. But more recently, the firm decided to establish a full-fledged office to better compete for legal business related to Sino-American trade.

Malibu-based attorney Robert Allan will oversee Alpha & Leader’s efforts here, while maintaining his own separate practice.

“Alpha & Leader will provide a bridge to firms and mid-sized businesses that want to do business in China,” Allan said.

According to Sunny Lin, a China-based attorney with Alpha & Leader, it is the leading law firm when it comes to “non-performing” loan transactions, a primary vehicle for investing in China. Non-performing loans are those made by state-owned banks to state-owned companies, a way of business life in Beijing.

“If a company wants to buy assets in China, the acquisition of those assets is typically accomplished by acquiring a non-performing loan portfolio, ” Lin said.

In addition to Allan, two other attorneys associated with the firm are based in the Los Angeles office.

Launching Pod

With titles such as “Overcoming a Fear of Firing” and “Lost Time Management,” attorney Helene Wasserman’s podcasts on employment-related legal issues could be mistaken for some New Age self-help guide for conflicted workplace managers.

But the podcasts address legally sensitive workplace issues such as sexual harassment and drug testing.

“We have created a means for employers, managers and executives to understand today’s important labor and employment issues on their own terms and at their own pace,” Wasserman said of the series, which she calls “Employer HelpCasts.”

The podcasts, which are offered free of charge, vary in length depending on the topic. A podcast dealing with obesity in the workplace and what employers can do to encourage healthy lifestyle choices was just 15 minutes, while the most recent posting on workplace culture runs over 40 minutes.

Wasserman, a partner in the Los Angeles office of Ford & Harrison LLP, began podcasting in June, to provide employers with an overview of important legal issues.

“I have gotten a lot of very positive feedback from people in senior management position,” Wasserman said. “There are some human resources executives that are forcing their whole team to listen to the podcasts.”

A number of future podcasts are currently in the works, including one that addresses generational conflicts in the workplace.

“We have more generations in the workforce than ever before, and employers need to know how to deal with each group separately. Each generation has its own carrots and sticks,” she said.

New Direction

Attorney Robert Blumberg has been named managing partner of the Los Angeles office of Littler Mendelson PC, a national law firm that specializes in labor and employment related matters and counts Tenet Healthcare, McGraw-Hill and Sears as clients.

As managing partner, Blumberg continues to maintain his own practice, which focuses on wrongful discharge, discrimination and harassment litigation, while also handling administrative duties for the 51-attorney Century City office.

“I feel privileged to be selected for this leadership role. It’s a great challenge and something very different from what I do as a lawyer. So much of what I do is defending businesses in litigation, but this role is about guiding a group of lawyers when it comes to business decisions,” Blumberg said of the appointment, which was announced earlier this month.

Blumberg has spent his entire 16-year legal career at Littler Mendelson. He began working at the firm’s Los Angeles office in 1991 as a summer associate while still in law school. The following year Blumberg joined as an associate after graduating.

Staff reporter Drew Combs can be reached at [email protected], or at (323) 549-5225, ext. 228.