Mr. Williams specializes in telecommunications litigation, arbitration, and contract negotiation, as well as in telecommunications advice and counseling. Mr. Williams also has extensive commercial litigation experience.
Following a clerkship with the Honorable A. Leon Higginbotham, Jr. of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, Mr. Williams spent 5 years as an associate at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison in New York City. While at Paul, Weiss, Mr. Williams litigated a wide range of contract, securities, bankruptcy, and other large commercial litigation matters. Mr. Williams later joined AT&T Corp., where he worked as an Attorney and Senior Attorney for 14 years. At AT&T, Mr. Williams's practice spanned the full spectrum of telecommunications matters. He litigated a wide range of tariff, contract, and statutory disputes before the Federal Communications Commission as well as numerous state public utilities commission, and litigated tariff and statutory disputes in federal district and appeals courts. Mr. Williams also practiced extensively under the Telecommunications Act of 1996 while at AT&T. He was a lead attorney representing AT&T in the seminal state regulatory proceeding regarding interexchange relief under Section 271 of the 1996 Act, and in the FCC review of that state proceeding. Mr. Williams also negotiated and arbitrated numerous interconnection agreements under Sections 251 and 252 of the 1996 Act. He also acted a lead attorney on major commercial arbitrations concerning telecommunications disputes while at AT&T.
In addition to his litigation and arbitration experience, Mr. Williams has extensive experience representing corporations in federal and state rulemaking proceedings. At AT&T, he led a successful corporate-wide initiative to persuade the FCC to adopt AT&T's preferred model for local number portability, resulting in the industry standard used today. Mr. Williams also has provided substantial legal counseling to telecommunications clients. For several years, he was one of two attorneys at AT&T primarily responsible for interpreting the requirements of the Modification of Final Judgment, the antitrust decree that resulted in the breakup of the American Telephone & Telegraph Company. Mr. Williams also acted as principal legal counsel for AT&T's Voice over Internet Protocol service for consumers, providing legal guidance, counseling, and advocacy on contract, consumer protection, privacy, E911, and tax matters for the service.
Mr. Williams received his B.A. in Economics, with distinction, from Stanford University and his Juris Doctor from Yale Law School, where he was an editor of the Yale Law Journal and the Yale Journal on Regulation. He is admitted to practice in New York.