Ira Kustin and Sherrese Smith

Ira P. Kustin is a partner in the investment management practice at Akin in New York, where he advises sponsors of, and investors in, hedge, credit, and private equity funds. He rejoined Akin in 2024 after more than five years as a partner at Paul Hastings. His practice covers fund formation, seeding transactions, secondaries, restructurings, and SEC registration, examinations, and compliance. He has been certified by a federal court as an expert on private investment funds and advisers, is ranked by Chambers USA and Chambers Global for hedge funds, and chairs the Practising Law Institute's annual Hedge Fund Management program. He earned his J.D. from New York University School of Law and his B.A., magna cum laude, from the University of Cincinnati. Sherrese M. Smith is the Global Managing Partner of Paul Hastings in Washington, D.C. She was named managing partner in 2021 and re-elected in 2025 to a term running through 2028. A data privacy, cybersecurity, and media and technology lawyer and former vice chair of the firm's Data Privacy and Cybersecurity practice, she advises on breach and crisis response, regulatory investigations and enforcement, and artificial intelligence and other emerging technologies. She is ranked in Band 1 by Chambers USA for Media & Entertainment: Regulatory and was named 2024 Managing Partner of the Year by Women, Influence & Power in Law. She previously served as Chief Counsel to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski and as Vice President and General Counsel of Washington Post Digital. She serves on the boards of Gen and Cable ONE and chairs Northwestern University's law school board. She holds a J.D. from Northwestern University School of Law and a B.S. from the University of South Carolina.