Cooley

LLP A limited liability partnership (LLP) is a partnership in which some or all partners (depending on the jurisdiction) have limited liabilities. It therefore can exhibit elements of partnerships and corporations. In an LLP, each partner is not ...

is an American international

law firm A law firm is a business entity formed by one or more lawyers to engage in the practice of law. The primary service rendered by a law firm is to advise clients (individuals or corporations) about their legal rights and responsibilities, and to ...

, headquartered in

Palo Alto, California Palo Alto (; Spanish for "tall stick") is a charter city in the northwestern corner of Santa Clara County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area, named after a coastal redwood tree known as El Palo Alto. The city was ...

, with offices worldwide. The firm's practice areas include corporate, litigation, intellectual property, fund formation, public markets, employment, life sciences,

clean technology Clean technology, in short cleantech, is any process, product, or service that reduces negative environmental impacts through significant energy efficiency improvements, the sustainable use of resources, or environmental protection activities. Cl ...

, real estate, financial services, retail, regulatory and energy. Cooley is particularly known for its technology and life sciences practices as well as its experience with marquee initial public offerings (IPOs) and deep-rooted

venture capital Venture capital (often abbreviated as VC) is a form of private equity financing that is provided by venture capital firms or funds to start-up company, startups, early-stage, and emerging companies that have been deemed to have high growth poten ...

connections & financing. It has consistently been ranked as an elite law firm for technology and life sciences companies,

startups A startup or start-up is a company or project undertaken by an entrepreneur to seek, develop, and validate a scalable business model. While entrepreneurship refers to all new businesses, including self-employment and businesses that never intend t ...

and emerging growth companies, and

firms by Above the Law, and '' U.S. News & World Report''. Cooley represents as clients over a third of the companies on ''

The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...

s Billion Dollar Startup Club. According to

Law360 Law360 is a subscription-based, legal news service based in New York City. It is operated by Portfolio Media, Inc., a subsidiary of LexisNexisSabroski, Suzxanne (May 1, 2012) LexisNexis goes 360, ''Onliline'' and delivers breaking news and analys ...

, Cooley is "widely regarded as one of Silicon Valley's go-to law firms". It is one of the fifty largest law firms in the world.

History

Cooley was founded by Arthur Cooley and Louis Crowley in 1920 in San Francisco. In 1958, Cooley formed Draper, Gaither and Anderson, the first venture capital partnership organized on the West Coast. In the 1950s, Cooley formed

Raychem The Raychem Corporation was founded in Redwood City, California, in 1957 by Paul M. Cook, James B. Meikle, and Richard W. Muchmore. Led by Cook and second-in-command Robert M. Halperin, Raychem became a pioneer of commercial products realized th ...

and

National Semiconductor National Semiconductor was an American semiconductor manufacturer which specialized in analog devices and subsystems, formerly with headquarters in Santa Clara, California. The company produced power management integrated circuits, display dr ...

. In 1971 the firm (then Cooley, Crowley, Gaither, Godward, Castro & Huddleson) began representing

Disney The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...

in the copyright and trademark infringement case '' Walt Disney Productions v. Air Pirates''. In the early 1980s, the firm took both

Genentech Genentech, Inc., is an American biotechnology corporation headquartered in South San Francisco, California. It became an independent subsidiary of Roche in 2009. Genentech Research and Early Development operates as an independent center within ...

and

Amgen Amgen Inc. (formerly Applied Molecular Genetics Inc.) is an American multinational biopharmaceutical company headquartered in Thousand Oaks, California. One of the world's largest independent biotechnology companies, Amgen was established in ...

public. In the late 1980s, the firm relocated its offices from San Francisco to

Palo Alto Palo Alto (; Spanish for "tall stick") is a charter city in the northwestern corner of Santa Clara County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area, named after a coastal redwood tree known as El Palo Alto. The city was es ...

. In 1989, the firm (then Cooley, Godward, Castro, Huddleson & Tatum) facilitated the IPO of Qualcomm. On October 31, 2006, the firm (then Cooley Godward) merged with Kronish Lieb Weiner & Hellman, which resulted in the firm growing from 440 lawyers to 550. In the announcement of the merger, ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' referred to Cooley as a "Leading

Silicon Valley Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that serves as a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical areas San Mateo Count ...

law firm". In 1995, two former partners of the firm, Robert Gunderson and Scott Dettmer, formed the law firm of Gunderson Dettmer. Like many other law firms, the firm laid off 114 people in 2009 from its offices, citing "the uncertain economy".

Offices

Cooley has offices in ten U.S. cities, London, Shanghai, Beijing, Brussels, and Singapore. Cooley launched in London in January 2015, creating a 55-lawyer practice and the firm's first office in Europe. Its lawyers were hired from the London offices of

Morrison & Foerster Morrison & Foerster LLP (also known as MoFo) is an American multinational law firm headquartered in San Francisco, California, with 17 offices located throughout the United States, Asia, and Europe. The firm has over 1,000 lawyers who advise cli ...

and Edwards Wildman Palmer, raiding the latter's entire office. The office is run by Justin Stock who headed the corporate department of Morrison & Foerster's London office before joining Cooley. The firm launched its Beijing office in 2018.

Recognition

The American Lawyer ''The American Lawyer'' is a monthly legal magazine and website published by ALM Media. The periodical and its parent company, ALM (then American Lawyer Media), were founded in 1979 by Steven Brill. Top Legal 500 and the ''

National Law Journal ''The National Law Journal'' (NLJ) is an American legal periodical founded in 1978. The NLJ was created by Jerry Finkelstein, who envisioned it as a "sibling newspaper" of the ''New York Law Journal''. Originally a tabloid-sized weekly newspa ...

NLJ 250 NLJ may mean: * Nathan Leigh Jones, a recording artist * The National Liberty Journal, a newspaper published by Jerry Falwell * The National Law Journal * National Library of Jamaica The National Library of Jamaica is the national library of J ...

has ranked Cooley's practice areas from second through eighth tier in its national survey of law firms. In addition, '' U.S. News & World Report'' nominated Cooley as the 2011–12 law firm of the year in

biotechnology Biotechnology is the integration of natural sciences and engineering sciences in order to achieve the application of organisms, cells, parts thereof and molecular analogues for products and services. The term ''biotechnology'' was first used b ...

law. In 2011, Cooley LLP was named U.S. Tax Court Firm of the Year by the '' International Tax Review''. Cooley was recognized as one of Law360's Capital Markets Practice Groups of the year for 2015, and 2019. In 2016, Chambers UK recognized Cooley as being a leading practice in six practice areas along with singling out sixteen lawyers for their performance. In 2018, Cooley was named by ''U.S. News & World Report'' as the #1 law firm in the country in both the

law and technology law categories, and the firm was named by The American Lawyer's Recorder publication as the top Venture Capital practice of the year. Cooley has been recognized as one of only five law firms (and the highest ranking of any law firm) to be listed on ''Fortune''s 100 Best Companies to Work For. The firm's first-year associates are paid a salary of US $215,000. 2018 * ''

Crain's New York Crain Communications Inc is an American multi-industry publishing conglomerate based in Detroit, Michigan, United States, with 13 non-US subsidiaries. History Gustavus Dedman (G.D.) Crain, Jr. ( Gustavus Demetrious Crain, Jr.; 1885–1973), pre ...

'' recognized Cooley on its 100 Best Places to Work in New York City list as the #4 best large company and the #1 law firm. * '' Fortune'' recognized Cooley on its Best Workplaces in New York list, designating the firm in the top 10 of all large companies in the state. 2019 *

Names Cooley 2018 Capital Markets Practice Group of the Year

References

{{reflist, 2 Law firms based in Palo Alto, California Law firms established in 1920 1920 establishments in California

History

Offices

Recognition

See also

References