Private Equity & Venture Capital

BFKN regularly counsels private equity sponsors and venture capital funds through all stages of their investments in portfolio companies – from initial investment through exit. In addition to buyout acquisitions and growth capital and venture capital investments, we advise portfolio companies of our private equity clients in connection with their day-to-day activities and their ongoing growth - whether through organic expansion, strategic relationships, or add-on acquisitions. Sophisticated yet efficient, we take an integrated approach to working with our fund sponsor clients to help them and their portfolio companies achieve their business and investment objectives. BFKN’s Corporate & Securities Group attorneys work closely with our tax, finance, intellectual property, employment, and employee benefits colleagues to structure, negotiate, and implement solutions to meet those objectives. Our work with private equity sponsors and venture capital funds has experienced significant growth in recent years, largely driven by key hires from multi-national law firms who bring their prior and extensive experience with them.

Our representation of private equity sponsors and venture capital funds is further enhanced by the extensive experience of our attorneys in representing early stage and middle-market operating companies and their founders and management. We understand the unique and challenging issues that founders and management face when they decide to partner with a private equity sponsor to help realize the full potential of their businesses. By the same token, we also understand the relationship between fund sponsors and their portfolio companies, which helps us effectively communicate with and counsel both our private equity clients as well as their portfolio companies.

Our work in this area includes:

• Representing private equity sponsors, venture capital funds, investment divisions of multi-national companies, and family offices in connection with buyout transactions and growth equity investments.
• Serving as deal counsel to portfolio companies in connection with add-on acquisitions.
• Representing incubators and venture capital funds in connection with seed equity and convertible investments (including SAFEs and convertible notes).
• Representing venture capital funds in connection with Fintech, Web3, and token investments.
• Representing family offices and other investors in connection with private equity fund, co-investment, and investment vehicle investments.
• Serving as outside general counsel (including intellectual property, finance, employment, employee benefits, real estate, litigation, and tax counsel) to portfolio companies.