Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton announced that Peter H. Carson, Lorna L. Tanner and Stephanie L. Zeppa have joined the firm as partners.
Carson joins the firm’s San Francisco office, as a member of the Finance and Bankruptcy practice group. Tanner and Zeppa join the firm’s Palo Alto office, as members of the Intellectual Property practice group and Corporate practice group, respectively.
Carson joins from Bingham McCutchen, where he was a member of the Transactional Finance practice and co-chaired the Healthcare Industry Group. Tanner joins from Foley & Lardner and Zeppa joins from Dentons.
“Peter, Lorna and Stephanie are outstanding additions to the firm. Their respective practice expertise and backgrounds tightly mesh with our San Francisco and Palo Alto offices, as well as firm-wide. We continue to grow our Bay Area offices and expand our bench to better serve clients’ needs,” said Guy N. Halgren, chairman of Sheppard Mullin.
Carson’s practice is focused on representing U.S. and foreign banks, business development companies, commercial finance lenders, debt funds, and other institutional lenders as well as company and private equity clients. He represents these clients in all aspects of complex secured and unsecured debt financings, including senior syndicated, asset-based, acquisition, mezzanine, second lien, credit enhancement and other financings, recapitalizations, and restructurings across a range of industries, such as healthcare, technology, retail, transportation and distribution, media and telecommunications, ski resorts, sports franchises, food and beverage, agriculture, and forest products.
Tanner counsels pharmaceutical, life science, and medical device clients on strategic issues relating to the development and management of their global intellectual property portfolios. Her practice focuses on preparing and prosecuting patents to ensure clients’ business objectives are met. Tanner performs due diligence analyses on patent portfolios for financings, mergers, and acquisitions and renders opinions on infringement, inventorship, and freedom-to-operate. Her technical emphasis is in pharmaceutically active small molecules, in clinical development with a primary focus on developing and executing patent strategies for late-stage and approved drugs. Tanner has experience in a variety of other technologies, including: polymers in the context of embolic compositions and adhesives; drug delivery, including pulmonary, topical, and pharmaceutical formulations; biologics such as modified proteins and viruses; green technologies such as clean coal refining; and medical devices, including aesthetic devices, syringes, catheters and embolic coils.
Zeppa has extensive experience in corporate finance and securities matters, such as mergers and acquisitions, capital-raising transactions and strategic commercial transactions. Her primary focus is on emerging growth and technology companies, with a company-side track record that spans the entire corporate life-cycle, including pre-incorporation planning, general corporate counseling, venture capital financings, strategic commercial transactions and mergers and acquisitions. Zeppa also regularly works with investors and financial institutions on capital-raising transactions for emerging growth companies. She has experience with companies in industries such as mobile, interactive entertainment products, new media and digital health.