Simon Upped at HFA

SIMON, SAYS HFA: Michael S. Simon has been upped to President/CEO for mechanical-rights org Harry Fox Agency, from SVP of Business Affairs, General Counsel and Chief Strategic Officer, succeeding Gary L. Churgin, it was announced by Chairman Irwin Z. Robinson. Since he first joined HFA 11 years ago, Simon has created a number of new opportunities for the company and the more than 46,000 publishers it represents while also improving HFA’s traditional mechanical licensing business. Before joining HFA, Simon was EVP Business Affairs and General Counsel for Razorfish, Inc., where he guided the company from a small private organization of 18 people into a public company with more than 2,000 employees and several hundred million dollars in revenues over five years. Prior to that, he founded Simon Ventures, an artist management and consulting company, whose roster included such major label acts as the Honeydogs and the Gigolo Aunts. He was also Sr. Director of Legal Affairs at Polygram Records and served as an associate in the entertainment and intellectual property law practice of Levine Thall Plotkin & Menin as well as in the corporate, litigation and entertainment practice of Rubin Baum Levin Constant & Friedman. Simon graduated magna cum laude from Amherst College and received his Juris Doctor from the Columbia University School of Law. With those credentials, why did he ever go into the music business? (10/16p)