Jay M. Goffman is co-founder and CEO of Smith Goffman Partners in New York. In this role, he works
to preserve and enhance the equity value of companies in or nearing distress. Prior to co-founding the
firm, he was with Teneo and was vice chair of Global Advisory at Rothschild & Co., a large international
investment bank, where he advised clients across Rothschild’s Restructuring, Debt Advisory and M&A
practices. Before Rothschild, he spent 36 years as a lawyer focused on restructuring, debt advisory and
distressed M&A. For the last 24 years of his legal career, he practiced at Skadden Arps, where he was
the global head of its Corporate Restructuring Department. Over the course of his career, Mr. Goffman
has consistently been recognized as one of the leading and most innovative restructuring advisors in
the world. He was named a “Dealmaker of the Year” by The American Lawyer and one of the “Most
Influential Lawyers of the Decade” by The National Law Journal. He has also received several Lifetime
Achievement and Hall of Fame honors, in addition to numerous philanthropic awards. Mr. Goffman is
best known for having devised and pioneered the “prepackaged” restructuring, now the predominant
method for most major restructurings — which revolutionized the field and has been used to reorganize
hundreds of companies in a quick, efficient and cost-effective manner. As a result of his efforts, prepacks
are now the predominant method used in major restructurings. Mr. Goffman has successfully reorga-
nized businesses out of court and in court across multiple industries and geographies, including some of
the largest, most high-profile and most complex cases in history. Many of his deals and accomplishments
have been profiled in various publications, including The Wall Street Journal. Mr. Goffman has received
numerous honors, including “Most Influential Lawyers of the Decade,” Dealmaker of the Year and sev-
eral Hall of Fame and Lifetime Achievement Awards, in addition to numerous philanthropic honors from
AJC, Catholic Renewal and Tina’s Wish. He is an ABI Board member and a member of the board of
trustees of the China Institute. Mr. Goffman received his B.S. in 1980 in chemical psychobiology from
the State University of New York at Binghamton and his J.D. in 1983 with honors from the University of
North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he was a member of the University of North Carolina Law Review.
In 2018, the University of North Carolina School of Law presented him with its Distinguished Alumni
Award.