Miriam Kim

Miriam Kim is a partner in the San Francisco office of Munger, Tolles & Olson. Her practice focuses on trade secrets matters, complex civil litigation and high-stakes investigations for technology companies. Ms. Kim has a reputation for solving her clients’ most challenging problems as if they were her own.

Ms. Kim speaks Korean and has successfully advocated for clients in a range of matters involving Korean companies. Ms. Kim’s pro bonopractice is focused on the needs of immigrants and victims of sexual abuse.

Ms. Kim is a leader in the community and a frequent speaker on diversity issues. She is co-chair of the Northern District of California Lawyer Representatives to the Ninth Circuit, a member of the board of the Bar Association of San Francisco (BASF) and an active member of Christ Church East Bay. Ms. Kim is also the immediate past president of the Asian American Bar Association and a former board member of BASF’s Justice & Diversity Center.

Ms. Kim has significant experience handling trade secret cases, copyright infringement cases involving software, and other IP matters for both plaintiffs and defendants. She has extensive experience leading internal investigations into potential theft of trade secrets or other confidential information. Noteworthy matters include representing:

• Amgen in trade secret litigation against Coherus relating to development of biosimilar to Neulasta.
• Applied Materials in case against ASM and former employee alleging threatened misappropriation of trade secrets relating to atomic layer deposition (ALD).
• Green Hills Software in its successful five-month arbitration against claims of copyright infringement and unfair competition relating to application programming interfaces (APIs).
• Disney’s Playdom, an online social gaming company, in copyright source code case. Reached favorable settlement on eve of trial.
• Applied Materials in successful defense of a jury trial against claims of patent infringement brought by Axcelis Technologies.

Ms. Kim has substantial experience handling complex business litigation for semiconductor, software and other technology companies and taking such cases to trial. Significant litigation matters include representing:

• Intel Corporation against allegations of breach of contract, breach of warranty, conspiracy, and fraud brought by Brazilian smartphone manufacturer.
• LG Electronics in federal multi-district antitrust litigation regarding cathode ray tube (CRT) price-fixing allegations.
• LG Electronics in CRT antitrust actions filed by the state attorneys general in California, Illinois, Oregon and Washington.
• Rambus in antitrust litigation involving multi-billion dollar claims against Samsung, Micron and Hynix. Samsung settled its litigation against Rambus for $900 million.

Ms. Kim has substantial experience handling litigation and investigations alleging false and misleading advertising, unfair business practices, and violations of other consumer protection laws. Matters include representing:

• Intel Corporation in successfully settling on the eve of trial a consumer class action involving claims of unfair business practices with respect to performance of Pentium 4 processors.
• PepsiCo in government investigation relating to the marketing of Gatorade.
• Various clients on claim substantiation, endorsements and risk optimization strategies related to marketing.

Ms. Kim has significant experience leading internal investigations on a wide range of issues, including alleged trade secret theft, unfair competition, breach of contract, fraud and whistleblower claims. She also represents companies in government investigations with a focus on state attorney general investigations. While the nature of this work is often confidential, Ms. Kim has gained a reputation for identifying critical witnesses and employing cutting-edge technology in order to conduct effective and efficient investigations.

Education :

• UC Berkeley School of Law (J.D., 2002) Order of the Coif
• Harvard University (A.B., magna cum laude, 1998)

Bar Admissions : California