Choate Elects Six to Partnership for 2022

Today Choate announced its largest class of new equity partners in the Firm’s history for the second year in a row. The six new partners each focus on a practice or specialty of strategic importance to the Firm’s clients and are leaders in their respective fields.

• Olivier Léger, a member of Choate’s Tax Group, advises private equity fund sponsors on U.S. tax matters through all stages of operations, including fund formation and portfolio company transactions, in order to help reduce the overall tax burden on the various stakeholders.
• Seth Mennillo, a member of Choate’s Finance & Restructuring Group, represents both banks and non-bank lenders in a variety of credit facility types and structures, including cash flow and asset-based acquisition and working capital financings, across a broad range of industries.
• Danielle Pelot, a member of Choate’s Government Enforcement & Compliance and Life Sciences Groups, helps clients in regulated industries to effectively address sensitive government inquiries, internal investigations, compliance reviews, and related complex litigation.
• Dr. John Rearick, a member of Choate’s Life Sciences and Intellectual Property Groups, helps pharmaceutical companies to achieve extended exclusivity strategic IP protection for novel small molecule therapeutics, as well as conducts due diligence evaluations on behalf of acquiring companies and investors, and advises clients on contentious patent matters before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB).
• Dr. Stephanie Schonewald, a member of Choate’s Life Sciences and Intellectual Property Groups, helps biotech and pharmaceutical companies to develop, strengthen, and defend their patent portfolios, including through contentious procedures like inter partes, post grant, and covered business method reviews both in jurisdictions across the U.S. and around the globe.
• Sophie Wang, a member of Choate’s Intellectual Property Litigation and Life Sciences Groups, is a trial lawyer and appellate advocate who helps biotech, pharmaceutical, and technology companies successfully resolve complex patent, trade secret, and commercial disputes in federal and state courts across the country, as well as in contentious PTAB proceedings such as inter partes review and post grant review.

These new elections to Firm partnership are effective January 1, 2022.