People

Matthew E.S. Coleman Partner

New York; Boston

Matthew helps clients comply with the Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography And Marketing Act (CAN-SPAM), the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 (CCPA), the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA), the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA), and state breach notification, biometric privacy, and cybersecurity laws. He counsels on self-regulatory privacy programs, including Binding Corporate Rules, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Cross-Border Privacy Rules (APEC CBPRs); programs covering online behavioral advertising, including the Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA), the European Interactive Digital Advertising Alliance (EDAA), the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), and the Network Advertising Initiative (NAI); and programs covering payment card processing. Matthew also provides compliance solutions for emerging technologies, including artificial intelligence and blockchain.

Matthew’s federal regulatory experience helps clients stay compliant and avoid regulatory scrutiny. His comprehensive data management knowledge helps him counsel beyond the letter of the law and facilitates worldwide expansion, interoperable business processes, and innovative uses of consumer data while maintaining user trust. His all-encompassing, risk-based approach involves developing and executing internal and external policies for the collection, use, disclosure, sharing, retaining, transferring, and destruction of personal information. This includes managing contractual relationships with vendors, employees, acquired entities, and creditors as well as building privacy into companies’ product development life cycle and change management strategies.

Prior to joining Orrick, Matthew was an Enterprise Privacy Solutions Manager for TrustArc (formerly TRUSTe), a San Francisco-based privacy consulting and certification firm, and an adjunct law professor of Privacy Law at Santa Clara University. Matthew is a Certified Information Privacy Manager and a Certified Information Privacy Professional with a specialization in United States privacy law.

Rachel Conder Associate

London

Rachel has experience working with companies of all stages, primarily in the technology sector, as well as venture capital funds and investors.

Erin M. Connell Partner

San Francisco

Erin's practice covers all aspects of employment law. She defends employers in class actions and other complex cases, as well as in systemic investigations and audits by the EEOC, DOJ, and the California CRD. Erin has led dozens of internal pay equity analyses and is a trusted advisor for several of the nation's most prominent employers on developing areas of employment law, including pay equity and pay transparency, DEI best practices, and the use of AI in employment decision making.

Erin also is an accomplished first chair trial lawyer. She has tried several cases before juries and in arbitration, and has obtained numerous defense summary judgment rulings and other favorable resolutions in state and federal court. Erin led the trial team that obtained a complete dismissal for Oracle in OFCCP v. Oracle, the largest pay equity case ever brought by the US Department of Labor, which garnered national media attention and earned Erin recognition as a "Litigator of the Week" by the American Lawyer and a 2021 Employment MVP by Law360. As lead counsel, Erin also successfully obtained decertification in a statewide California pay equity class action, Jewett v. Oracle.

Erin's clients include leading technology and Fortune 500 companies, including: Oracle, Meta, Microsoft, Netflix, Pinterest, Workday, PayPal, Sony Interactive Entertainment, NVIDIA, Airbnb, SiriusXM, Dropbox, Zendesk, Splunk and Goldman Sachs. 

Erin frequently speaks on California and national employment law issues. She is currently a Council Member with the American Bar Association’s Labor and Employment Law Section (LEL) and is the Conference Chair for the American Employment Legal Council (AELC). She is also a faculty member with the Institute for Workplace Equality (IWE), and formerly served as the management chair of the ABA Equal Employment Opportunity Committee. Erin also previously served on the Board of Directors for the Bar Association of San Francisco (BASF), as well as BASF’s Justice & Diversity Center (JDC). She has published numerous articles and papers on employment law issues in publications around the country. She also provides employment law training and conducts internal investigations on employment-related matters.

Catherine Conners Associate

Boston

Catherine's practice focuses on buy-side and sell-side mergers and acquisitions, both domestic and cross-border. She practices across a variety of industries, including energy, technology and software, healthcare and life sciences. As a member of the firm's EnergyTech team, Catherine focuses on advising companies developing next-generation technologies in energy storage, carbon capture, alternative fuels and agtech.

Kristin Cornuelle Of Counsel

Portland

Kristin focuses on U.S. and international trademark and copyright counseling and prosecution, advising on branding strategies, and resolving trademark-related disputes for clients in a variety of industries, including food and beverage products, retail and clothing, consumer products, cloud computing, software and Internet services, social networking and online gaming. She has extensive experience in advising and representing clients in proceedings before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office as well as the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board. In addition, Kristin maintains an active pro bono practice in the areas of trademark and copyright law, homelessness, housing, and domestic violence.

Prior to her legal career, Kristin held various executive level positions in both the non-profit sector and local government.

Jennifer Criss Of Counsel

Washington, D.C.

Jennifer's practice focuses on negotiating the intellectual property and information technology aspects of complex commercial and corporate transactions, from mergers and acquisitions to financing transactions to corporate divestitures and spin-offs. She also works with technology companies to more mature entities on complex commercial transactions.

Jennifer routinely advises clients on strategic partnerships and guides companies at every stage of corporate acquisitions where intellectual property and technology are key assets. She drafts, negotiates, and advises clients on various software commercial and IP licenses, software as a service (SaaS) and cloud services agreements, software and product development agreements, joint development agreements, software and hardware contracts, and related consulting agreements. Jennifer works with cross-border clients across numerous technology-driven sectors, including entertainment, media, clean energy, biotechnology, and retail.

Additionally, Jennifer has extensive knowledge of copyright law and counsels clients on all aspects of copyright protection.

Jennifer has been an active member of the American Bar Association's Section of Intellectual Property Law and involved in its leadership for over 10 years. In August 2023, she began a 4-year position as one of 16 members of the Section's Council, helping to establish policy and resolutions on behalf of the IP Section. Jennifer has also been a member of its Continuing Legal Education (CLE) Board since 2016. She previously served on the Section's Nominating Committee. She previously served as vice chair of the ABA's Copyright Division (2020-2021) and was chair of the Committee on Copyright & Social Media. 

Jennifer is a Fellow of the American Bar Foundation. Her speaking engagements and publications have addressed topics such as asset sales involving intellectual property, ownership matters, copyright permissions, fair use, online harassment, and data privacy and cybersecurity.

Before her legal career, Jennifer earned her Ph.D. in the History of Art from the University of Pennsylvania. She taught art history at The George Washington University and American University. She received fellowships from the French Ministry of Education (Chateaubriand Fellowship), the Philadelphia Museum of Art, The Phillips Collection, and the University of Pennsylvania.

Wendy Butler Curtis Chief Innovation Officer

Washington, D.C.

Named the "Most Innovative Lawyer of the Year" by Financial Times in 2018, Wendy is celebrated by clients for her “fresh thinking, legal nuance and practical understanding of the courts.” FT editors noted that “rarely have our panel of judges so quickly homed in on a top candidate for innovative individual.” As Orrick’s Chief Innovation Officer, Wendy leads Orrick’s efforts to operationalize innovation through novel products, streamlined processes, technology and client consulting on tailored solutions. These efforts have contributed to Orrick being named the Most Innovative Law Firm in North America by the Financial Times from 2016-2018 and seven consecutive years being in the top three. In 2018, The American Lawyer also honored Orrick with its first-ever Legal Services Innovation Award.

Wendy leads an innovation team of lawyers, technologists, developers, project managers and business professionals. FT notes that Wendy “understand[s] the diversity of roles that make a team great” and has “introduce[ed] many new technologies and delivery models that have transformed the way the firm operates and works with clients.” She is also recognized by Chambers as a leading individual, nationally, in the area of eDiscovery. Wendy is the chair of Orrick’s eDiscovery and Information Governance Group. She has been engaged by Fortune 100 companies and major financial institutions to create and deploy eDiscovery and records management programs. Wendy has substantial experience in pharmaceutical, product liability and class action litigation. Her litigation experience includes multiple trials, supervision of regional and local counsel, management of complex discovery and meet-and-confer negotiations.

Allen Davis Senior Associate

Washington, D.C.

Allen assists businesses in identifying, assessing, and mitigating risks related to competition matters, collaborating closely with clients to develop tailored compliance strategies, guiding them through the complexities of antitrust laws at both domestic and international levels. He represents clients in a broad range of antitrust issues arising from mergers and acquisitions (including Hart-Scott-Rodino (HSR) filings and second requests), complex civil litigation, government investigations (including civil investigative demands (CID)) and general counseling. Allen represents clients across a diverse range of industries, including consumer technology, digital advertising, pharmaceuticals, e-commerce, real estate, and energy.

Recent notable experience includes representing:

• A software company in a successful defense of Clayton Act § 7 litigation
• A large insurer in connection with allegations of price fixing in violation of Sherman Act § 1
• A technology company in connection with discovery in a number of enforcement actions against Google LLC
• A generic pharmaceutical manufacture in defense against Sherman Act §§ 1-2 claims

Behnam Dayanim Partner

Washington, D.C.

Behn advises gaming and gambling providers, large media companies, Fintech, blockchain and more traditional financial services participants, and other technology and consumer-focused companies on issues at the intersection of gaming, financial services, data privacy and governance and related regulatory areas. Clients turn to him for his ability to advise on the whole frame of issues they may encounter, and he is equally comfortable guiding emerging companies in the early stages of their lifecycles and mature, multinational public companies. Behn is at home in the courtroom – representing clients in cutting-edge gaming litigations, before regulatory bodies – helping the crypto industry address growing sanctions and other financial services obligations, and in the boardroom – assisting in the formation of significant commercial partnerships, brand licenses, acquisitions and other combinations.

Bas de Blank Partner

Silicon Valley

In addition to his ITC practice, Bas also heads Orrick’s contentious prosecution practice. He has led more than 30 IPRs and first-chaired more than a dozen trials before the United States Patent Office, as well as represented clients in dozens of trials in district courts, and before PTAB.

As someone with degrees in both engineering and English literature, Bas is uniquely suited to present complicated topics to non-technical audiences. He has represented clients in fields as diverse as semiconductor processing and structure, GPS and geosynchronous satellites, image texture and graphics processing, Internet switches and communications, and various consumer products.

Tamir Jonathan Debbi Senior Associate

New York

Tamir’s practice focuses on a range of transactional matters involving intellectual property and innovative technologies, with an emphasis on advanced software applications as well as life sciences. Tamir has significant experience and counsels clients on structuring and negotiating complex technology commercialization agreements, such as SaaS and other software agreements, medical device and pharmaceutical royalty arrangements, and other general corporate and technology dealings.

Prior to joining Orrick, Tamir was an associate in the Technology Transactions Group at Morrison & Foerster in Silicon Valley, where he maintained a technology practice focused on cross-border transactions involving emerging-growth companies and venture capital, and advising startups on their operations, acquisition and exit strategies.

Mike Delikat Partner

New York

He is also the founder of the firm’s Whistleblower Task Force. He previously served as the Managing Director of Orrick’s Litigation Division. The practice group under Mike’s leadership was chosen as one of the top national employment law practices by Law 360.

Chambers USA and Chambers Global has ranked him in Band 1 since it began publishing its rankings, noting he is "a giant of the employment bar, widely regarded as an expert in whistleblowing matters and sex harassment claims,” “sought out by premier clients to handle high-stakes employment litigation and investigations,” and "one of the best lawyers on the East Coast for financial institutions."

Mike has an active trial, arbitration, and appellate practice and handles a number of high-visibility class action and impact cases. He is regularly retained by boards of directors and audit committees to conduct high exposure internal investigations of corporate wrongdoing.