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Law360 (August 11, 2020, 6:25 PM EDT) --
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| Peyton Worley |
Peyton Worley, a former Cooley LLP corporate partner who recently joined Latham & Watkins LLP, told Law360 that while the pandemic initially caused a slowdown in most deal types, the second half of the year has already been a busy one. He said through the end of July, he was already 60% busier than he was last year, which also saw a lot of activity.
Worley anticipates that pace to continue as investors with long-term returns in mind steadily invest in businesses with established remote and work-from-home setups and enterprises that could easily transition to that model.
"So as soon as they realized that these businesses would be able to operate remotely, they said, 'Let's get back to business,'" Worley said. "I think people are finding innovative ways to address issues that must have been there pre-COVID, and they're looking at them differently now and finding ways to solve them."
Worley joined Latham as the firm was seeing a ramp-up in clients needing guidance on funding. Last month alone, Latham publicly revealed that its emerging companies practice advised businesses holding or participating in a total of $332 million in financing rounds.
Worley said he was "massively impressed" by the breadth of Latham's industry and regulatory expertise which he said his clients have increasingly needed as the technology industry has evolved.
"I was really drawn to almost limitless expertise in the various industries and regulatory areas that my clients are facing," he said. "And pairing up my practice with that expertise and the goal of continuing to magnify the build-out of the emerging company practice just all came together."
Worley received his law degree from Boston University School of Law in 2001, and he is admitted to practice in both New York and Massachusetts.
He worked at Sullivan & Worcester LLP before moving to Cooley as a sixth-year associate, where he practiced for 13 years. He said he moved from Boston to the New York market in 2010. As part of his practice, he has aided his clients in their formations, advised on securing financing, and led negotiations for mergers and acquisition terms, among other business activities.
His clients come from a variety of industries, including social and digital media, artificial intelligence, health care, e-commerce, enterprise software, network security, content publishing and biopharmaceuticals as well as insurance, financial and advertising technologies.
Marc Jaffe, global chair of Latham's corporate department, also said that the first six months of 2020 had been "incredibly busy" for all of the firm's corporate practices.
"One of the trends we've noticed is technology and life science [companies] are not only going nowhere but are becoming increasingly important," Jaffe told Law360. "Those companies are going to be the companies that feed our practice over the next couple of decades, whether it's in capital markets or M&A or litigation or regulatory."
Latham acted as issuer or underwriter counsel in 10 of the 47 initial public offerings last month, meaning the firm advised on more initial public offerings in July than any other law firm. The largest offering Latham steered last month was health insurance platform GoHealth Inc.'s $914 million launch.
And across all of July's IPOs, life science companies represented the largest component, making up 12 of the offerings.
On the M&A side, Latham guided intellectual property manager CPA Global in its $6.8 billion tie-up with U.K.-based analytics company Clarivate, which was advised by Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP.
August has started on a similar note for Latham, with the firm leading German medical technology business Siemens Healthineers AG's $16.4 billion buy of Varian Medical Systems Inc. Varian was guided by Wachtell Lipton Rosen & Katz.
John Chory, global chair of Latham's emerging companies practice, credited the spirit of technology and life science company founders for the consistent flow of deals and transactions.
"We are in the middle of a pandemic, but the DNA of the entrepreneurs that make up our clients — that start these companies and that help them continue to grow — their DNA is they fight through adversity," Chory told Law360. "There's a lot of opportunity in New York, which is why we're really thrilled to get Peyton here to help us in New York and, frankly, globally."
In addition to the firm taking the lead in how it has handled the increased activity, Worley also cited Latham's ability to address a variety of his clients' concerns, which he said include questions about payment regulation, advertising regulations, privacy matters, cross border transactions and related tax implications.
Jaffe noted that the firm's broad expertise has continued to be important as companies debate whether to pursue traditional IPOs, direct listings or merging with blank check companies.
"Having been here as long as I have, financing trends, transaction trends change, and the best way to add value to your clients is by being facile and by allowing folks to turn on a dime and one-stop shop," Jaffe said. "We want to be top of our game with all of these options and opportunities, and I think we're not going to rest until we are."
--Additional reporting by Tom Zanki and Benjamin Horney. Editing by Jill Coffey.
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