When Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom restructuring partner Jay Goffman stood before a Manhattan bankruptcy court judge last November to ask for Chapter 11 protection for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc., it wasn’t the start of a drawn-out restructuring but rather the coda: Goffman had a plan in place that had been approved by almost all of the studio’s 350 secured lenders, all but ensuring that there would be no unexpected court battles.
Goffman likes his court appearances short and sweet. Ever since 1991, when he pushed through one of the earliest prepackaged bankruptcies, for now-defunct computer peripherals company Memorex Telex N.V., Goffman has done more to promote the virtues of the lightning-quick filings than perhaps anyone. By his own count, he’s done at least 15 prepacks, including the first such plan approved over creditor objections, for In-Store Advertising, in 1992. He also handled the first prepack that was approved in under 30 days, a 13-day bankruptcy for Harvest Foods Inc. in 1997, and the shortest, a one-day in-and-out affair for Blue Bird Bus Corporation, in 2004. “I believe in them,” Goffman says. “My job isn’t to take a company and do a long, drawn-out restructuring. My job is to take it, fix the problem, and give it back.”
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