People

Rachel Nghe Associate

Silicon Valley

Rachel's practice is focused on her client's transactional technology and intellectual property needs. Rachel represents clients at all stages of their life cycles and in a variety of technology-driven industries, including SaaS, artificial intelligence, gaming, entertainment, and media. Rachel has experience drafting commercial, licensing and other intellectual property and technology agreements. She also assists clients with intellectual property issues in connection with mergers and acquisitions.

Prior to joining Orrick, Rachel spent three years working on the commercial and product counseling teams at Dropbox, Inc., and two years with the Department of Justice Anti-trust division. She was also an active member of the ChIPs Network focusing on advancing and connecting women in technology, law and policy while she was in law school.

KT Nguyen Associate

Seattle

KT assists these companies with their legal needs as they expand, with a focus on corporate governance and venture financing. He also represents venture capital firms seeking to invest in these high growth companies.

KT graduated from the University of Washington School of Law, where he served as a Managing Editor of the Washington Law Review. He also was a member of the Entrepreneurial Law Clinic, where he advised entrepreneurs on early stage general corporate and intellectual property matters.

Prior to attending law school, KT was a graduate student researcher at the University of California, San Francisco. During grad school, he also worked in the technology transfer office where he helped to consult with inventors within the university to assess the patentability and commercialization prospects of their inventions.

Serena Nichols Managing Associate

San Francisco

Serena's practice focuses on representing individuals and companies in a broad range of industries in government and internal investigations, securities litigation, regulatory enforcement actions, and other complex business litigation. Her experiences include conducting internal investigations and representing companies and individuals in investigations by the U.S. Department of Justice, the U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission, the Federal Trade Commission, and the Drug Enforcement Agency. Serena represents companies in the technology and financial sectors in a wide range of civil disputes including claims of breach of contract and patent infringement. 

Lauren Nilles Associate

New York

Lauren also represents investors and venture capital firms in their investments in technology companies. 

Prior to joining Orrick, Lauren was an associate in the Corporate Group at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati in New York. 

Caleb R. Nissley Managing Associate

Los Angeles

Caleb represents issuers, sponsors, placement agents, underwriters, servicers, and other market participants in connection with securitizations, private placements, asset financings, sales, and the negotiation of lending facilities.

He is also active in several pro bono cases involving the Geneva Convention IV’s application to the ongoing Russo-Ukraine war and that of a Ghanan family seeking asylum.

In 2020, Caleb graduated from the University of California, Irvine School of Law. While in law school, Caleb co-authored a brief argued before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and served as Editor for the UC Irvine Law Review.

Prior to law school, he worked for several years at J.P. Morgan Chase with positions in corporate finance, mortgage banking, credit card operations, and compliance.

Filippo Nola Senior Associate

Milano

Filippo has developed significant experience in real estate transactions and all types of acquisition financings and leveraged buyouts transactions both in the syndicated and in the take-and-hold space, including senior debt, unitranche financings, high yield debt and mezzanine capital, structured as loan facilities as well as bonds issuances.

Prior to joining Orrick, Filippo was an associate in a primary standing international law firm.

Seth Norris Managing Associate

Washington, D.C.

Prior to Orrick, Seth worked as a legal intern for the Beijing office of the Natural Resources Defense Council, where he conducted research on international environmental permitting standards, and as a consultant for a Boston-based energy & infrastructure holding company, where he advised on globalization and work force optimization strategies for a wind turbine services business.

Flavio Notari Partner

Milano; Roma

Flavio ha maturato una significativa esperienza in affermati studi commerciali e legali, italiani e statunitensi.

Dottore Commercialista e Revisore Legale vanta una solida esperienza nell’ambito della fiscalità domestica, così come in quella internazionale.

I suoi clienti sono soprattutto imprese nazionali tecnologiche e gruppi industriali multinazionali, che vengono seguiti nelle fasi di start up, scale up, processi di internazionalizzazione, così come per le problematiche di fiscalità delle operazioni straordinarie.

Advisor di acceleratori di imprese, e di numerose startup tecnologiche, Flavio segue con grande attenzione i percorsi di innovazione del tessuto imprenditoriale italiano, promuovendone la competitività e diffondendo la cultura del rischio.

Flavio è docente a contratto in Financial Accounting presso l’università americana John Cabot University.

Co-Fondatore di BAIA Italia - Business Association Italy America, contribuisce alla definizione della visione e strategia dell’associazione.

È Membro del gruppo di lavoro sulle startup innovative di AIAF – Associazione Italiana degli Analisti e Consulenti Finanziari.

È autore di diverse pubblicazioni in materia tributaria, e con frequenza relatore in convegni.

*Not an admitted lawyer

Yvonne Nyborg Analyst

San Francisco

Yvonne T. Nyborg is an Employee Benefits Analyst with 28 years of experience providing sophisticated legal services to large clients with multiple complex tax-qualified retirement plans.  As an Employee Benefits Analyst, she provides high level legal services at reduced rates. 

She focuses on qualified retirement plan design and compliance, including company acquisitions and dispositions, plan mergers and spinouts, large controlled group nondiscrimination testing analysis, plan drafting and preparation of employee communications and enrollment materials.  Yvonne has extensive experience in defined benefit plan compliance issues, and in terminations of large defined benefit plans in accordance with Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation requirements.  She is also an authority on obtaining favorable determination letters from the Internal Revenue Service approving the tax-qualified status of various types of retirement plans, and in responding to Internal Revenue Service and Department of Labor plan audits.  In addition, Yvonne is highly proficient in answering day-to-day administration issues and in assisting attorneys with the research of legal issues impacting all types of employee benefit plans.

Yvonne has completed courses I-III, VI, VIII, IX, Certified Employee Benefit Specialist Program, 1987-1993, and holds a Certificate from the Institute for Employee Benefits Training, 1985.  She received her B.A. degree from the State University of New York at Albany in 1984.

Robert M. O'Connell Jr. Of Counsel

Boston

His experience includes clearance, registration and protection of trademarks, trade dress and designs; opposition and cancellation proceedings in the TTAB; UDRP and other domain name proceedings; registration and protection of copyrights; negotiation and drafting of a variety of coexistence, licensing and other IP-related agreements; and providing IP support on various M&A and financing transactions, most recently including a groundbreaking series of securitization deals involving music and television rights involving household-name artists.

Businesses ranging from small start-ups to multi-billion-dollar corporations turn to Bob for help developing and implementing cost-effective domestic and global branding and trademark protection plans. They hail from the financial services, food & beverage, apparel, retail and pharmaceutical industries, among others.

Bob’s significant transactional experience includes a trademark and merchandise license agreement for a large resort casino in Las Vegas, and naming rights and sponsorship agreements for a major league sports stadium and a prominent performing arts center.

He also has extensive commercial litigation and dispute resolution experience in both intellectual property and other matters in state and federal trial and appellate courts, in inter partes and appellate matters before the Trademark Trial & Appeal Board, and in UDRP arbitration proceedings. Noteworthy reported cases include: Coach Services, Inc. v. Triumph Learning LLC, 96 U.S.P.Q.2d 1600 (TTAB September 17, 2010) affirmed, 668 F.3d 1356 (Fed. Cir. 2012).

In the 2023 edition of World Trademark Review 1000, a listing of the world’s top trademark practitioners based on peer and client surveys, Bob received top-tier rankings for trademark prosecution and strategy with clients praising him for his “pragmatism, calmness, under pressure and fine-grained, detailed work product. Previously, WTR 1000 reported that Bob “wins effusive praise for his “pragmatic approach and unparalleled attention to detail.” “Simply stated, he is among the most cost-effective, business-oriented lawyers in any specialty.” “He is of incredible value – he matches anybody on expertise and exceeds most, if not all, on responsiveness and efficiency.” In prior years, WTR 1000 reviewers have said: “He never fails to address domestic and global branding issues quickly and comprehensively, causing one client to profess: ‘He is the only lawyer that I would use for trademark work in the Boston area.’” Bob has been characterized as a “distinguished” and “highly respected practitioner” with “a great reputation” in multinational mandates, who is “a trusted adviser in helping to build value in…brands” and “commands respect” particularly in the strategy and commercial field.” He has been listed in WTR 1000 each year since its inaugural edition in 2011, as well as WTR’s Global Leaders short-list since 2019.

Noteworthy past and present client engagements include:

• A famous sports footwear and apparel brand with trademark enforcement and opposition matters;
• The world’s largest retailer with trademark clearance matters across several business lines, as well as complex trademark prosecution and TTAB matters;
• A “super-regional” bank with a portfolio of hundreds of federal and state trademarks and an active TTAB and UDRP enforcement program;
• A global spirits company with hundreds of brands and an extensive enforcement docket;
• A leading global private equity firm;
• A national women’s apparel retail chain with stores across the United States and Canada; and
• A branded pharmaceutical company with pioneering products for both human and veterinary medicine.

Mike O'Donnell Partner

Silicon Valley

Michael applies his broad experience in venture capital financings, public offerings, mergers and acquisitions, strategic alliances, technology licensing, and corporate spin-out transactions to each engagement. He has undertaken over 300 venture capital financings raising an estimated $7 billion for his clients, recently assisting Auris Health to raise over $650 million in financings before its sale to J&J for up to $5.75 billion.

He also brings extensive experience negotiating strategic alliances, representing clients in significant collaborations with GSK, Amgen, Schering-Plough, J&J, Daiichi, Astellas, King Pharmaceuticals, and most recently Pfizer, Merck, Baxter and Dainippon Sumitomo Pharma Co., Ltd.

Michael was the lead lawyer on the initial public offerings for Illumina, Neurocrine Biosciences, Cytokinetics, Pain Therapeutics, NeurogesX, Sequana Therapeutics, Ciphergen Biosystems, Argonaut Technologies, and Microcide Pharmaceuticals.

Michael was also the lead lawyer responsible for negotiating many notable biopharmaceutical spin-outs, including Onyx Pharmaceuticals (Chiron-Cetus), Tularik (Genentech), X-Ceptor (Ligand Pharmaceuticals), Metabasis (Gensia Sicor), and as well on the reverse merger of Transcept Pharmaceuticals with Novacea, creating a new publicly traded entity.

 

David O'Donovan Managing Associate

Londra

David's experience primarily includes renewable energy projects (onshore and offshore wind, solar PV, energy-from-waste and green hydrogen) and other energy transition projects (including carbon capture, utilisation and storage) with a particular focus on M&A, joint ventures and project development. He also has experience advising on governance, regulatory and ESG-related matters.