Dan Freshman is an associate in the intellectual property transactions and venture capital & emerging companies practices at Ropes & Gray. He focuses on representing companies in the life sciences, consumer & retail, and technology sectors in a variety of strategic transactions and partnerships.

Dan represented clients in 3 of the top 10 largest biopharmaceutical licensing deals of 2020 measured by deal value, according to an analysis published in Fierce Biotech.

Prior to joining Ropes & Gray, Dan worked for the Major League Baseball Players Association in its Licensing & Business Affairs department, and at Canary, a connected home technology company based in New York.

Experience

Licenses, Collaborations, Joint Ventures and Strategic Partnerships

  • Advised Beam Therapeutics in various collaboration and license agreements, including with Prime Medicine, Inc. to research and develop a novel gene editing technology called prime editing, and with Verve Therapeutics, pursuant to which Beam grants Verve exclusive rights to certain base editing, gene editing and delivery technologies for human therapeutic applications against cardiovascular targets.
  • Advised BlueRock Therapeutics in its strategic research and development alliance with FUJIFILM Cellular Dynamics to discover and develop off-the-shelf iPS cell therapies for ocular diseases, including dry age-related macular degeneration and inherited retinal diseases.
  • Advised Sanofi in an exclusive worldwide collaboration with Skyhawk Therapeutics for up to more than $2 billion to discover and develop novel small molecules that modulate RNA splicing for challenging oncology and immunology disease targets with limited or no therapeutic options.
  • Advised Takeda Pharmaceuticals in various collaboration and license agreements, including its strategic multi-target partnership with Sosei Heptares to discover, develop and commercialize novel molecules that modulate G protein-coupled receptor targets, and its joint venture with Third Rock Ventures to form Ambys Medicines, a company founded to discover and develop novel cell and gene therapies for liver diseases.
  • Advised Vivli, a nonprofit organization that collects and shares participant-level anonymized data from clinical trials, on various growth initiatives and product counseling matters relating to the development of its data sharing platform.
  • Advised a global pharmaceutical company in an exclusive collaboration with a publicly traded biotechnology company to exclusively co-develop and co-commercialize a clinical stage small molecule inhibitor for the treatment of Parkinson’s Disease.  The pharmaceutical company agreed to pay over $550 million in upfront payments, agreed to purchase over $450 million of the biotechnology company’s common stock, may pay up to $1.125 billion in potential milestone payments, will share costs of development globally as well as profits and losses in certain countries, and received exclusive options and rights of first negotiation with respect to future programs directed towards the treatment of certain neurodegenerative diseases.
  • Advised a global pharmaceutical company in an exclusive multi-program collaboration with a publicly traded biotechnology company directed towards the joint development and commercialization of certain antibody therapies for the treatment of cancer. The pharmaceutical company agreed to pay $750 million in upfront payments, may pay over $3 billion in future milestone payments, and will share in the profits and losses with respect to the future development and commercialization of such product candidates in certain countries.

Emerging Companies

  • Advised Philos & Partners SA in connection with its investment in Neurelis, Inc.’s $114 million Series D preferred stock financing.
  • Advised Tmunity Therapeutics, a private clinical-stage biotherapeutics company, in connection with its Series Seed, Series A, and Series B financings, on various ongoing corporate and commercial matters, and in its eventual sale to Kite Pharma.
  • Advised Vivo Capital on various venture investments in companies in the technology, healthcare and biotechnology sectors.
  • Has advised various venture-backed companies on venture financing, corporate governance, intellectual property, and other ongoing commercial matters, including Foghorn Therapeutics, GNS Healthcare, and Seventh Sense Biosystems. 
  • Has advised various venture capital firms in early stage venture investments in companies in the technology, healthcare and biotechnology sectors.

Mergers & Acquisitions

  • Advised various consumer-facing brands and franchise businesses on intellectual property aspects of whole-business securitizations and follow-on offerings, including European Wax Center, the Goddard School, and Planet Fitness.
  • Advised Atlantic Media on copyright, fair use, First Amendment and other intellectual property matters in connection with the acquisition of a majority ownership stake in The Atlantic by the Emerson Collective, a non-profit organization founded and run by Laurene Powell Jobs.
  • Advised BPEA EQT in partnership with Nord Anglia Education in its $1.25 billion acquisition of IMG Academy from Endeavor.
  • Advised TSG Consumer Partners, a private equity firm focused exclusively on the branded consumer sector, on intellectual property matters in connection with its minority investment in Huda Beauty, a beauty and cosmetics brand founded by beauty blogger and entrepreneur Huda Kattan.
  • Advised Visterra, Inc., a private clinical stage biopharmaceutical company, in its $430 million sale to Otsuka Pharmaceutical.
  • Advised Waters Corporation, a leading specialty measurement company, in its acquisition of Andrew Alliance, an innovator in specialty laboratory automation technology, including software and robotics.

Data Privacy and Cybersecurity

  • Advised a global laboratory instrument and software company in a global privacy and cybersecurity assessment.
  • Has advised various investment managers and asset management companies on compliance issues and best practices relating to data privacy and cybersecurity.

Areas of Practice