Latham Watkins and Ropes & Gray have taken lead roles on the the closely watched bankruptcy of Gawker Media Group, which came to a close on Tuesday (16 August) when the embattled online company was sold at a Chapter 11 auction held in Ropes' New York office.

US media company Univision Communications was the winning bidder for Gawker, with a reported $135m (£103m) offer for the debtor. Gawker's Chapter 11 case – which began in June after the company was ordered by a Florida jury to pay $140m (£106m) to wrestler Terry Bollea, better known as Hulk Hogan – has brought work to a handful of major law firms.

Latham corporate restructuring co-chair Peter Gilhuly is leading a team from the firm advising New York-based Univision on the proposed purchase, which is still pending full approval.

The Univision work came to Latham as a result of the firm's recruitment of a team of entertainment, media and sports lawyers from O'Melveny & Myers in November 2014. The group also advised Univision in 2010 on a $1.2bn (£913m) investment by Mexican media giant Grupo Televisa.

Gilhuly said that while Univision had looked into buying Gawker in the past, the lead-up to its winning auction bid required a huge amount of work in a short timeframe.

"We did a ton of diligence for what was really a new kind of company," said Gilhuly, explaining that among the complexities surrounding Gawker is the fact that Kinja Kft, its blogging platform, is based in Hungary. "It's quite complicated for not a massive deal."

Gilhuly also took roles advising now defunct firms Dewey & LeBoeuf, Howrey and Thelen before their respective bankruptcies.

Throughout its bankruptcy proceedings, Gawker was represented by Ropes & Gray restructuring partner Gregg Galardi, who joined the firm earlier this year from DLA Piper. Hourly rates for the firm's partners working on Gawker's bankruptcy case range from $880 (£670) to $1,450 (£1,100), according to court filings. Ropes corporate partner Jonathan Gill handled transactional aspects of the sale.

Gawker founder Nick Denton (pictured above) filed for personal bankruptcy protection in New York earlier this month.

Court filings in the case show that Simpson Thacher & Bartlett is counseling an official committee of Gawker's unsecured creditors, which at the time of the company's bankruptcy filing in June included Fried Frank Harris Shriver & Jacobson, among other law firms.

In a formal application by creditors to employ Simpson Thacher, the firm disclosed hourly rates for its services as between $1,085 (£826) and $1,315 (£1,000) for partners. Simpson Thacher bankruptcy partner Sandeep Qusba, who joined the firm's New York office in a rare lateral move from White & Case in 2000, is advising creditors.

Gawker's bankruptcy and subsequent sale has drawn much attention for a number of reasons, including the freedom of speech and litigation financing questions it has raised, not to mention the details associated with Hogan's underlying suit against the debtor.

Hogan sued Gawker after the company posted a video – without his permission – of him having sex with a friend's wife. It was later revealed in news reports that Peter Thiel, a former Sullivan & Cromwell associate and billionaire co-founder of PayPal, had funded Hogan's litigation against Gawker.

Thiel has also been the subject of stories published by Gawker-owned media properties and is an outspoken advocate of privacy in the digital age.

The battle with Hogan is not the only case pending against Gawker. Mail Online, owner of the Daily Mail, filed a defamation suit against Gawker last year for publishing an article by a former employee claiming that the company plagiarised other news organisations.