Abe Melamed brings extensive mediation experience to Signature Resolution, specializing in the practice areas of employment, data privacy and consumer class actions, personal injury, business and intellectual property.
Melamed prides himself as the “creative mediator,” approaching each mediation with creativity, passion, and out-of-the-box thinking. He has developed a strong understanding of the parties’ needs in mediation and an ability to adapt his communication and mediation style to different personalities. Melamed is at the cutting edge of mediation, being one of the first mediators to incorporate Artificial Intelligence (AI) in his practice, hosting a popular video and audio podcast and LinkedIn mediation game, and beta testing virtual reality and multi-dimensional video capabilities for remote mediations.
Prior to his transition to mediation full-time, Melamed had a distinguished career as a civil litigator in a variety of practice areas, including employment, data privacy and consumer class actions, commercial/business, personal injury, and intellectual property.
After graduating from law school, Melamed began his career working for several well-respected personal injury law firms in New York, before finding his calling as an employment and commercial litigator. Melamed joined Gulko Schwed LLP, a firm specializing in complex commercial, corporate and business, real estate litigation and transactions including motion drafting and practice, and patent and trademark filings and prosecution. In this role, Melamed offered advice and counsel and litigated cases spanning all aspects of business and corporate law.
While acting as of counsel at Gulko Schwed LLP, Melamed co-founded L and M Innovations, LLC, a law firm incubator, handling select business, technology, fashion, and consumer innovations. His team was responsible for evaluating products, engaging in research and development including market research, and assisting creators in assessing the viability of products. In this role, Melamed drafted and filed patent and trademark applications related to the products and performed relevant legal work as necessary.
While maintaining his role with L and M Innovations, LLC, Melamed transitioned to the Derek Smith Law Group, one of the country’s largest plaintiff-side employment litigation firms, and quickly worked his way up from associate to the youngest partner at the firm in the span of three years. He was then tasked with founding the Los Angeles office of the firm, where he spent several years as its managing partner. During this time, his legal practice centered on advocating for employees entangled in employment discrimination, sexual harassment, and wage-related disputes. Additionally, he championed consumers’ rights in consumer fraud class actions within state and federal courts across California, New York, and Arizona. He adeptly managed a substantial caseload in this capacity, from initial pre-litigation investigations and negotiation phases to eventual trial and appellate processes. In this capacity he made the law on several employment and consumer related issues, such as standing in data breach cases in the 2nd Circuit, and he filed amicus briefs in the 9th circuit and the Supreme Court of the United States on First Amendment issues. Melamed also provided direct representation and supervisory guidance for clients throughout hundreds of mediations across the country.
After focusing primarily on plaintiff-side work, Melamed transitioned to defense-side work as in-house employment counsel for a large insurance company, and also founded Melamed Law, LLC, where he acted as outside counsel to several large businesses, including a pharmaceutical manufacturer, a multi-state marijuana conglomerate, an insurance company, a hospital, a medical cost-reporting company, and several nationwide nursing home chains.
Having seen litigation from all sides of the field, Melamed recognized the value in mediation and alternative dispute resolution. Motivated by a career-long fascination with combining law, psychology and emotional intelligence, Melamed made the transition from litigator to full-time mediator in 2021, founding Melamed Mediation, mediating disputes across the country. Melamed brings this experience and passion to Signature Resolution.
In addition to his litigation and mediation experience, Melamed serves as an adjunct professor at the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University, teaching a course on negotiation, and he has previously served as an adjunct professor at Touro University, teaching undergraduate legal subjects. He is also a published scholar with the UCLA Women’s Law Journal on the topic of parental leave laws in the U.S., as well as with the New York Law Journal and Arizona ADR Forum, and regularly produces mediation resources, including podcasts, blogs, YouTube video series, and e-books.
Melamed is also an amateur musician. He was classically trained in piano, guitar and flute, and he is currently learning to play the violin. Melamed is also an amateur artist. In 2020 he blended his passion for art and music by inventing a piano that paints onto a canvas as it is played, resulting in a visualization of the music on canvas and a two-dimensional artistic experience. Melamed performed at the 2021 Don’t Block Your Blessings festival along with several artists under the title The Piano Art Project, and the patent he wrote and filed for his invention is currently pending.