Law360 has selected Morrison & Foerster's Private Equity Practice as a  2021 Practice Group of the Year, highlighting the team's extensive experience and continued success in private equity. This award honors the law firms behind major deals that resonated through the legal industry in the past year.

MoFo's Private Equity + Buyouts practice was recognized for representing key clients, including SoftBank, Silver Crest, Sky Harbour LLP, Paine Schwartz Partners, Alpine Investors, Main Post Partners, and Fremont Macanta in major deals around the globe. Our group's recent market leading deals include:

• Advising SoftBank Group Corp. as the largest investor in Social Finance, Inc ("SoFi") in connection with SoFi's $8.65 billion de-SPAC transaction;
• Assisting Silver Crest Acquisition Corporation in connection with its $1.7 billion business combination with TH International Limited;
• Representing Pivotal Investment Corporation II in its US$3 billion merger with XL Fleet;
• Advising Sky Harbour LLC in connection with its US$777 million business combination agreement with Yellowstone Acquisition Company;
• Assisting Paine Schwartz Partners in connection with its new platform investment in Registrar Corp.

Renowned for sophisticated counseling on complex transactions, both domestically and internationally, our Private Equity team handles leveraged buyouts, growth equity investments, divestures, joint ventures, and SPAC transactions. We are focused on both traditional private equity and creative capital raising, successfully navigating deal-making in the current environment by helping all investors to find assets and raise and deploy capital through creative structures. In addition, we leverage our breadth of industry experience to anticipate and meet the ongoing market changes.

With 110 private equity attorneys on our global team, we are well positioned to serve our international client base on domestic and cross-border deals across the U.S., Europe, Asia, and Latin America.

Marcia Ellis serves as Global Chair of the Private Equity practice. A U.S. and Hong Kong-qualified, Hong Kong-based partner and former Asia GC of D. E. Shaw, Marcia is one of the most experienced and sophisticated private equity lawyers active in the Asian market. Known as a "super-skilled technical lawyer" with "incredible problem-solving skills on all aspects of matters," she has advised clients on deals with a total aggregate value of over US$171 billion in the past two years. Consistently recognized as a leading private equity lawyer, she was recently named "Dealmaker of Asia, Hong Kong" and "Female Dealmaker, North Asia" 2021 by Asian Legal Business.

San Francisco-based partner Patrick Huard leads the U.S. Private Equity Group. Patrick has significant experience representing private equity sponsors in all aspects of their investment activity across a wide variety of industry sectors, including technology, life sciences and healthcare, financial services, consumer and retail, aerospace, defense and government contracts, and ESG/impact investing.

MoFo's Global Corporate Co-chair Mitchell Presser is also a Private Equity insider, bringing the business aspects of his experience to the execution of his high-profile private equity transactions. A founding partner of Paine Schwartz Partners, Mitchell served as an investor for eight years, with a focus on the food and agriculture industries. His practice expertise has informed his work at MoFo and he is also Co-chair of the global Food + Agriculture industry practice. Based in New York, Mitchell has been recognized as a top lawyer by Chambers  USA and Legal 500 US.