About Us

Ioana Racoti is a leading corporate finance lawyer, specializing in all aspects of corporate law, including transactions on the capital market, public offerings, company listing and de-listing, private placements. Her experience also includes advising financial institutions and borrowers in complex loan transactions, syndicated facilities, creation and perfection of guarantees and securities, and project finance.

Dr. Shlomo Cohen heads Dr. Shlomo Cohen & Co., one of the most respected boutique intellectual property firms in Israel. From 1999 to 2007, he was President of the Israel Bar, both the statutory professional trade union for Israeli lawyers and the organization that certifies lawyers to practice law in Israel.

Luís Sáragga Leal is co-founder of PLMJ. Today, he focuses his practice on Corporate, Mergers & Acquisitions, and Projects & Infrastructure. His expertise is in corporate governance, exports & international trade, and foreign investment. He is also active in his legal community; he was President of the Bar Association's Institute of Law in 2005.

Ted Mayer is a member of the firm's Executive Committee and its Compensation Committee. He formerly chaired the firm's Litigation Department and his practice focuses on product liability and on complex litigation generally. Mr. Mayer’s product liability work has included leading successful defense efforts in many of the largest and most complex tort litigations in the US over the past three decades as well as in many individual cases. He has coordinated the national defense of several m...

Dr. Bernt Elsner is head of the department for procurement law, EU competition law and public commercial law and head of the CMS-wide Section Procurement. He studied business administration at the University of Vienna Law and at the Vienna University of Economics, was 1993/1994, a researcher at the Austrian Constitutional Court for constitutional judge Prof. Dr. Karl Spielbüchler and Prof. Dr. Karl Korinek worked and has 17 years of experience as a lawyer including an activity for Cleary Gott...

Don Lents' practice focuses on corporate governance, mergers and acquisitions, securities law and general corporate matters with particular emphasis upon responsibilities of boards of directors, multinational and domestic mergers, acquisitions and divestitures, anti-takeover planning, and related matters. He is co-author of a treatise on Missouri Corporation Law and Practice and of articles on various corporate law issues. He has been an adjunct professor at the Washington University Law School.

Michelle C. Ifill is the Senior Vice President and General Counsel for Verizon’s Services Operations & Technologies units, responsible for primary legal oversight and support of the Verizon Corporate Information Technology Organization and the Chief Administrative Office, including Sourcing, Real Estate and Fleet Management. Ms. Ifill’s team also has primary responsibility for a variety of intellectual property areas, including copyright, trademark, and patent licensing.

Michael Blair is the firm’s Presiding Partner. Mr. Blair has served as lead counsel in a host of major M&A transactions, advised senior executives and boards of directors on governance matters and handled securities transactions for clients across a range of industries. Mr. Blair joined Debevoise in 1981 and became a partner in 1989. He received his B.A. from Yale University in 1977 and his J.D. from the University of Chicago in 1981. Mr. Blair is a Director of The Partnership for New Yor...

A personal adviser to dozens of the world’s most active and influential business leaders and families, Joseph Shenker has counseled clients on significant transactional matters across a number of practice areas and industry sectors. His practices include M&A, corporate governance, capital markets, tax, sports & entertainment, private equity, financial services, commercial real estate, restructuring, and family business transaction.

William Perlstein is a partner in the firm's Bankruptcy and Financial Restructuring Practice Group, and a former co-managing partner of the firm. Among his many professional activities, Mr. Perlstein is a Fellow and Counsel to the American College of Bankruptcy.

As a Senior Client Advisor within Perkins Coie’s Client Advantage team, Mark leverages his wide-ranging experience to help his general counsel clients innovate, solve problems, understand trends in legal services and bring value to the law firm-client relationship. Clients in both public and private sectors turn to Mark Roellig for his decades of experience at the highest levels of Fortune 500 companies. Armed with best practices and deep knowledge, he advises general counsel and their senior...

Kenichi Fujinawa is the Managing Partner of Nagashima Ohno & Tsunematsu, the first law firm in Japan to surpass the 100-lawyer milestone. As of January 1, 2009, the firm has 334 lawyers (inclusive of foreign-licensed lawyers). Mr. Fujinawa focuses his practice in the field of Mergers and Acquisitions.