William joined Ropes & Gray's corporate department as part of the class of 2020. William represents clients in a variety of commercial, intellectual property, and strategic transactions, including advising on complex deals involving technology, branding & content, consumer products, entertainment, and life sciences. William’s experience runs the gamut of transactional structures, including mergers & acquisitions, licensing and collaborations, asset sales & purchases, joint ventures, financings, supply chain management, and whole-business securitizations. Additionally, William assists emerging companies in ongoing startup, financing, and corporate governance matters.
During law school, William externed with the in-house legal team for Toast, a restaurant technology company, where he assisted with commercial contract review, and product and partnership pipeline matters. Will also interned for the Honorable Manuel Real in the United States District Court for the Central District of California, participated in the Boston University Law Review, and was an active member of the Asian Pacific American Law Student Association, as well as the Latino American Law Student Association.
Experience
Licensing, Technology, and IP Transactions
- Represented Vince Holding Corp. in its strategic partnership with Authentic Brands Group, a global brand development, marketing and entertainment platform, whereby:
- VNCE will contribute intellectual property to ABG Vince for a total consideration of $76.5 million in cash and a 25% membership interest in ABG Vince; and
- VNCE entered into an exclusive, long-term license agreement with Authentic to use the contributed intellectual property for VNCE’s existing business.
- Represented a global enterprise technology company in the acquisition of a software product and related IP assets (e.g., source code, trademarks, and patents). Counseled and negotiated a transitional, limited-term patent license to the seller to sunset certain customer contracts not included in the acquisition.
- Represented FB Debt Financing Guarantor, LLC and certain of its subsidiaries, a producer of top beauty brands including Morphe®, Morphe 2®, Jaclyn Cosmetics®, and Born Dreamer®, in their 363 carve-out sale of the r.e.m. beauty business to an entity associated with Ariana Grande, AGREM BTY, LLC.
- Represented Morgan Stanley Tactical Value in its investment in OneTeam Partners, including advising on licensing and commercializing group publicity rights of professional and collegiate athletes.
- Represented Pfizer Inc. in a $1.24 billion dollar ex-U.S. strategic collaboration agreement with Biohaven Pharmaceutical Company to commercialize rimegepant, a therapy approved in the U.S. as Nurtec ODT for the acute treatment of migraine attacks and the preventative treatment of episodic migraines.
- Represented computer-aided biotechnology company in the structuring and negotiation of a global co-marketing arrangement.
- Represented Bain Capital in a transaction to acquire PowerSchool Holdings, Inc, a leading provider of cloud-based software for K-12 education.
- Represented venture capital firm in string of investments in multiple private technology and SaaS-based companies, including analyzing such companies’ IP development and contracting practices.
Mergers & Acquisitions and other Transactions
- Represented TPG Capital in an agreement to acquire from AT&T the remaining 70% stake in DIRECTV, a provider of satellite television network and digital television entertainment services.
- Represented Advent International in its strategic investment in Prometheus Group, a global provider of comprehensive and intuitive enterprise asset management software solutions and current portfolio company of Genstar Capital.
- Represented numerous famous brands on the IP aspects of whole-business securitizations and follow-on offerings, including Domino’s Pizza, European Wax Center, Zaxby’s, and Goddard School.
- Represented Haveli Investments, a technology-focused private equity firm, in its acquisition of ZeroFox Holdings, Inc., a provider of external cybersecurity.
- Represented Gauge Capital LLC in its partnership with Craftable, a leading SaaS platform for the hospitality industry.