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MoFo ESG + GCs: Practices, Priorities and Perspectives

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MoFo is excited to again partner with Corporate Counsel on the upcoming second annual environmental, social, and governance (ESG) benchmarking survey report: GCs and ESG. The 2023 survey includes 27 questions, incorporating feedback from senior in-house counsel querying organizational, individual, and departmental attitudes and approaches to ESG.

MoFo is excited to again partner with Corporate Counsel on the upcoming second annual environmental, social, and governance (ESG) benchmarking survey report: GCs and ESG. The 2023 survey includes 27 questions, incorporating feedback from senior in-house counsel querying organizational, individual, and departmental attitudes and approaches to ESG. The survey results will be published in June, with the report to include the first year of comparative data that reveals year-over-year practical and cultural shifts.MoFo invites you to join us for a fireside chat and interactive panel discussion with industry leaders for an overview of the GCs and ESG survey results. We will explore how the role of in-house legal leaders has shifted and how ESG considerations have morphed from a nice-to-have marketing strategy to a top regulatory priority and significant concern for stakeholders. The virtual event will provide commentary and insights for legal departments across a variety of ESG-related issues, including:<ul><li>Whether in-house legal departments still view ESG and their role in its adoption and promotion too narrowly</li><li>Why legal departments should drive ESG compliance within their organizations as demands increase for more meaningful action and transparency</li><li>How legal departments have increased their time spent on the “E” in ESG, including strategies to prepare for SEC’s climate-related disclosure rule and other regulations coming out of the EU</li><li>Strategies on how to link executive compensation with qualitative ESG metrics to capture financial performance, including specific focus areas and KPIs</li><li>How to think beyond a top-to-bottom approach (that is having leadership oversee ESG strategy) to include a bottom-up approach to ensure overall organizational alignment—to attract and retain the best talent while driving value and achieving significant and resilient results on ESG performance</li><li>How organizations are responding to anti-ESG backlash</li><li>How companies need to go beyond strategy to operational alignment</li></ul>View a recording of the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XI6VssSMRtY" target="_blank">Welcome and Introduction</a>View a recording of the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zyeay9ASWH8" target="_blank">Fireside Chat</a>View a recording of the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UrIgYolXcg" target="_blank">Panel Discussion</a><h5>Speakers </h5>Fireside Chat <ul><li>James Cotton, Managing Counsel – Securities & Corporate Governance and Assistant Corporate Secretary, United Airlines</li><li>Jackie Liu, Partner, Public Companies Counseling + Compliance and Corporate Governance practices, MoFo</li></ul>Panel Discussion <ul><li><a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/joanna-rosen-forster-04709071/" target="_blank">Joanna Rosen Forster</a>, Interim General Counsel & Chief Compliance Officer, Wish</li><li><a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnperkins/" target="_blank">John Perkins</a>, Director, Senior Corporate Counsel, Salesforce</li><li><a href="https://www.pgecorp.com/corp/about-us/officers/corporation/brian-wong.page" target="_blank">Brian M. Wong</a>, Vice President, Deputy General Counsel, and Corporate Secretary, PG&E Corporation; Vice President, General Counsel, and Corporate Secretary, Pacific Gas and Electric Company</li><li>Stacey M. Sprenkel, Co-chair of the ESG practice and Global Ethics and Compliance practice lead, MoFo</li><li>Moderator: Alfredo B. D. Silva, Co-chair of the Social Enterprise + Impact Investing practice, MoFo</li></ul>The event will be hosted by Susan H. Mac Cormac, Co-chair of MoFo’s ESG and Social Enterprise + Impact Investing practices.<hr>

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Susan (“Suz”) co-chairs the ESG + Sustainability and Social Enterprise + Impact Investing practices. Her practice focuses on late-stage financings, secondaries, and other corporate transactions for investors, such as SoftBank and Temasek, and on investments for some of the top investors dedicated to impact, from “impact first” foundations to family offices to private equity funds. She co-led the drafting group for the first of the new corporate forms (the Social Purpose Corporation in California), has created hybrid/tandem corporate structures and crafted debt and equity instruments that blend impact with traditional financial terms, and has used corporate law to develop creative capital market solutions to pressing environmental problems. She also advises the boards of public and private companies on corporate governance and fiduciary duties as applied to sustainability and climate change.She was named a California Lawyer Attorney of the Year (CLAY) in 2012 and 2016 by Daily Journal and the Most Innovative Lawyer in North America in 2015 by the Financial Times.Leading Business AdvisorA powerhouse negotiator, clients note that “you cannot get a better corporate counsel” and that Suz “understands the big picture, could not be more responsive, and understands the business” (The Legal 500 US). She has extensive experience providing corporate and finance advice to companies and investors in connection with growth equity financings and secondaries, with particular experience in late-stage investments that have come to rival traditional strategic acquisitions in size and significance. Her experience includes leading some of the highest-profile late-stage investments over the past few years, including notable transactions for SoftBank Group (in the two largest private tender offers in history) in its $7.7 billion investment in Uber, $4.4 billion investment in WeWork, further $10 billion investment in WeWork, $1 billion investment in SoFi, and $250 million investment in Kabbage. She has also advised Temasek on its $800 million investment in Verily Life Sciences, Intel on its equity investment in Cloudera, and each of Fortress, TPG Rise, Vision Ridge Partners, Generation Investment Management, and Pontifax AgTech in numerous mid- to late-stage investments in clean technology, sustainability, education, food, and agriculture technology.Social Enterprise and Impact InvestingSuz is the go-to legal resource for social enterprises (for-profit and non-profit companies focused on social or environmental purpose), impact investors (investors interested in social or environmental returns), and mainstream companies developing environmental, social, and corporate governance policies. With deep expertise in the impact investing model, institutional investors exploring the space turn to her for creative solutions and her ability to structure both investments and companies to emphasize impact and returns.She represents a wide range of investors who are focused on impact, from foundations like the Gates Foundation, The Nature Conservancy, and The Rockefeller Foundation, to family offices like Armonia, Cornerstone Capital, Emerson Collective, New Island Capital, and Omidyar Network, to private equity funds like Goldman Sachs, TPG Rise, Vision Ridge Partners, and Generation Investment Management, in their equity investments in companies and projects that are focused on generating impact and returns for investors. She has deep experience and expertise ensuring energy, sustainability, and other investments have positive impact through the use of new corporate forms, hybrid or “tandem” structures with non-profits and for-profits, and alternative debt and equity instruments.Notable work in this space includes the establishment of a tandem structure, The Carbon Endowment, to retire coal assets at scale while securing a revenue stream for community reinvestment and job training in coal communities. Suz also advised on the structuring of Common Sense Growth as an extension of the non-profit Common Sense Media (to invest in companies that address issues related to children, education, and technology), the establishment of a fund for TPG Rise to provide debt financing to Echoing Green fellows, the spin-out of PRX from Public Radio International (to generate new revenue flows up to the non-profit), the establishment of a for-profit joint venture with non-profit Medicines360 (to allow the non-profit to distribute its healthcare products to women in the developing world), and the structuring of a for-profit evergreen fund that allows The Nature Conservancy to aggregate return-seeking and donor capital in order to invest in preserving our natural resources. She has also advised numerous clients on converting to a public benefit corporation or social purpose corporation model (which requires balancing traditional fiduciary duties against a social or environmental purpose), including This American Life, Revolution Foods, Rise Labs, and Beneficial State Bancorp.Suz also regularly advises boards of directors of private and public companies, special committees, and CEOs on corporate governance, particularly the intersection of fiduciary duties with sustainability, and focuses on environmental, social, and governance issues.Unmatched Cleantech and Renewable Energy ExperienceIn addition to founding and chairing the firm’s Social Enterprise and Impact Investing Group, Suz serves as Chair of Morrison & Foerster’s Energy Group and has extensive experience representing start-up to late stage private companies in the clean technology or sustainability space. She provides corporate and finance advice in connection with equity and debt financings, mergers, acquisitions, asset purchases and sales, reorganizations, and joint ventures. She has experience working with renewable energy start-up companies and renewable energy developers in the solar, wind, and biofuels industries. Suz has assisted renewable energy start up companies with raising venture capital and has advised renewable energy developers on project acquisitions.Suz’s representative renewable energy, cleantech, sustainable, and social enterprise clients include Anaergia, Change.org, EDF Renewables, E.ON, Etsy, First Look, OneSun, Planet Labs, Rising Sun Energy, RSF Social Finance, SustainBio, Trelys, Inc., Wikipedia, and Xpansiv.Board Activity and Thought LeadershipMs. Mac Cormac was a founding board member of the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB), is a member of the board of directors of Business for Social Responsibility (BSR), the Ceres President’s Council, and the Earth Genome Project, and is an advising board member of the Committee Encouraging Corporate Philanthropy’s Strategic Investor Initiative.She has joined the faculty (teaching on the intersection of sustainability and fiduciary duties) at both the Stanford Director’s College and the Northwestern Corporate Counsel Institute and is an adjunct professor at UC Berkeley School of Law, teaching a course on Social Enterprise.

Susan Mac Cormac

Partner

Jackie engages in a general corporate and transactional practice, with special emphasis on corporate counseling of public companies, mergers and acquisitions, and the China practice.She has more than 20 years of experience in advising public companies on corporate governance matters, including director and officer fiduciary duties, board “best practices,” disagreements between board and management, succession planning, investor relations, and advises boards and special committees in connection with conflicts of interest matters, proxy contests and other corporate control efforts. Jackie is outside general counsel to a number of public companies with whom she has worked for over 20 years and provides big‑picture, critical value-adding strategic advice. She also counsels public companies on disclosure matters and associated liability considerations. Jackie has lectured at seminars and conferences and written articles on various corporate governance and securities law matters.Jackie also represents a number of public and private companies in mergers and acquisitions, from small asset acquisitions and divestitures, founder-driven sales and talent acquisitions to complex multibillion-dollar transactions. In addition, she has been involved in a number of complex cross-border transactions in Asia, Australia and Europe. Her knowledge of U.S. SEC-reporting requirements is a valuable addition to counseling on public-company M&A transactions. She additionally works with a number of well-established Chinese companies in setting up U.S. subsidiaries and counseling them on strategic matters relating to their U.S. operations.Jackie formerly served as co-chair of Morrison Foerster’s Global Corporate Department of over 400 lawyers.In 2018, Jackie received the Client Choice Award from International Law Office/Lexology for excellent client care and quality of service in the practice of corporate law. She was named the 2013 Legal Advisor of the Year by M&A Advisor. She was also recommended as a leading attorney in the field of M&A by Legal 500 USA 2014 and, in 2018, recommended for M&A/Corporate and Commercial: M&A Large Deals ($1bn+).She was born in Shanghai, China. She is fluent in Mandarin Chinese.She is a member of the California State Bar and the Bar Association of San Francisco. She is a board member of the Foundation of City College of San Francisco. Jackie is also a member of our global ESG + Sustainability steering committee.During her tenure at Harvard Law School, she served as the co-editor of the Harvard Law Record.<h4>Rankings</h4>Recommended for M&A: Large Deals ($1bn+) Legal 500 US 2019

Jackie Liu

Alfredo Silva is a partner in the Transactions Department, co-chair of the firm's Social Enterprise and Impact Investing Group, and a member of the ESG Strategy Committee. Alfredo represents companies and investors in a broad range of corporate and securities law matters, with a focus on businesses in the life sciences, agtech and fintech sectors. Alfredo’s practice includes capital markets transactions, venture capital, growth equity and corporate venture financings, tender offers and other secondary offerings, digital token matters, and mergers and acquisitions. Alfredo also helps clients leverage environmental, social and governance (ESG) factors to evaluate risk and opportunities and to invest responsibly in businesses seeking sustainable growth and impact.In his private company practice, Alfredo has served as company or investor counsel in early- and late-stage financings, minority strategic investments and impact investments in dozens of private companies, including representation of SoftBank and SoftBank Vision Fund in financings with a combined value of over $2 billion, Temasek in its $800 million minority investment in Verily Life Sciences, an Alphabet company, and Visa Ventures in strategic fintech investments around the world.In his public company practice, Alfredo counsels issuers on strategic transactions, such as the stock-for-stock merger of Marrone Bio Innovations, Inc. with Bioceres Crop Solutions Corp, as well as corporate governance and compliance with the U.S. federal securities laws and stock exchange listing standards, including advising on cutting-edge issues with respect to ESG disclosures and materiality assessments.In addition, Alfredo works extensively with nonprofit organizations, providing advice on fiduciary issues, entity formation, structuring and other corporate matters, and assists small businesses pro bono. He incorporated and continues to advise Illuminate, the nonprofit producer of The Bay Lights, a 25,000 LED sculpture on the western span of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge, in structuring, corporate governance, and project management matters. Alfredo currently chairs the audit committees of the boards of directors of Eat. Learn. Play. Foundation, a charity founded by four-time NBA champion Stephen Curry and The New York Times bestselling author Ayesha Curry to unleash the potential of every child, and Berkeley Repertory Theatre, an international leader in innovative theater whose shows have won eight Tony Awards, nine Obie Awards and a Pulitzer Prize, among many other honors.Alfredo is recognized by The Recorder as a 2013 Lawyer on the Fast Track, in 2014 was the inaugural recipient of the firm’s Kathi Pugh Award for Pro Bono Service, is a 2017 Lawyers Committee for Legal Diversity Fellow, and was the recipient of the American Bar Association’s 2023 National Public Service Award. Alfredo received his B.S. degree, cum laude with distinction, in Engineering Sciences (Chemical) from Yale College in 2004 and received his J.D. degree from Yale Law School in 2008. Alfredo speaks conversational Spanish and Mandarin Chinese, and spent a year at China’s Tsinghua University researching issues in intellectual property protection on a Fulbright Fellowship.

Alfredo B. D. Silva

<div class="videoWrapper"><iframe class="sticky-video" title="Meet MoFo San Francisco Head of Litigation Stacey Sprenkel" allow="autoplay; encrypted-media" allowfullscreen="1" frameborder="0" src="https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/wNOyJe_ZnZI?rel=0" title="iframe"></iframe></div>Stacey is a member of Morrison Foerster's ESG + Sustainability, Global Ethics and Compliance, and FCPA + Global Anti-Corruption practices. She regularly assists clients with assessing compliance risks across a broad range of issues and developing strategies to mitigate risks. She conducts anti-corruption, human rights, and compliance-focused due diligence in connection with acquisitions and other transactions, and provides day‑to‑day counseling on a broad range of compliance issues.Stacey’s practice is focused on pro-active compliance risk mitigation and counseling. She works with legal and compliance teams, executive leadership, and boards of directors to assess compliance risks across organizations, and to assess whether existing compliance programs and controls are sufficient to address identified risks. She assists with ESG risk mapping exercises and human rights impact/saliency analyses, as well as compliance program benchmarking exercises. She helps companies from start-ups to large global companies develop and enhance compliance programs, and assists with the development of strategies to stay ahead evolving legal regimes and enforcement environments. Stacey leverages her master’s degree in human rights to advise companies in connection with not only avoiding corruption, human rights, and other ethics and compliance risks and issues, but also in developing effective mechanisms to remediate such issues if they arise.When issues do arise, Stacey also leads corporate internal investigations spanning a broad range of issues, including bribery, kickbacks, embezzlement, self-dealing, insider trading, accounting fraud, economic espionage, and health care fraud. Stacey advises clients related to these issues in jurisdictions around the globe, including in North America, Latin America, Europe, Africa, Russia, India, and Asia-Pacific. She also represents clients in connection with SEC and DOJ investigations and enforcement proceedings, and in complex commercial litigation involving False Claims Act, civil RICO, and antitrust matters.Stacey was named to the 2018 list of the “Top 40 Under 40” lawyers in California by the Daily Journal and was also recognized by the Daily Journal as being among the “Top Five Associates to Watch” in California in 2013. She was recently shortlisted for Compliance Lawyer of the Year as part of the 2020 Women in Compliance Awards. She has also been previously recognized by The Recorder as being among the “Lawyers on the Fast Track,” a list of attorneys in California whose early accomplishments indicate they will be tomorrow’s top lawyers and leaders. In addition, Euromoney Legal Media Group selected her as one of eight women recognized on a 2014 shortlist of litigation rising stars for the “Americas Women in Business Law Awards,” which honors the achievements of women leading the legal sector across the Americas. She has also been recommended as a “Rising Star” by Super Lawyers every year since 2009.Stacey regularly speaks on panels on issues related to ESG, human rights, and anti-corruption compliance. Most recently she served as a panelist for MoFo’s “ESG + GCs: Practices, Priorities and Perspectives” webinar, joined a co-branded webinar with McKinsey on “Elevating the Bar for Transparency: SEC Proposed Rules & Potential Implications for Investors,” and participated in EY’s Leading with Integrity Webcast during a panel session focused on “Mitigating Fraud and Corruption risks in ESG.” She will also be joining Ethisphere’s upcoming ESG Virtual Forum to lead a panel focused on “The Regulators are Coming: Should Ethics & Compliance Take the Lead on ESG.”Stacey has long been a champion for veterans’ rights and has been a key team member on several high-profile impact cases on behalf of veterans. These cases include a class action on behalf of veterans who were exposed to chemical and biological substances during their time in service as a result of secret human testing programs conducted by the United States military along with an action brought on behalf of veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder against the Department of Veterans Affairs for failure to provide statutorily mandated benefits and healthcare to returning troops. She has also been involved with proposed legislation relating to veterans’ rights and consults on a number of other matters (judicial and legislative) related to veterans’ rights. Stacey has also handled a number of other pro bono matters, including advising an anti-corruption organization in The Gambia about proposed anti-corruption legislation and working with the Northern California Innocence Project in an effort to secure the release of a prisoner who has been serving 24 years in prison for a crime he did not commit.Stacey was the head of Morrison Foerster’s San Francisco Litigation Department for five years. She is admitted to practice in California.<h4>Representative Experience</h4><h5>Human Rights and ESG-Focused Matters</h5><ul><li>ESG Risk Mapping Exercise. Assisted a leading global technology company in connection with mapping ESG legal and compliance-related risks across the organization in order to develop appropriate risk mitigation strategies.</li><li>Human Rights Supply Chain Tracing Exercise. Assisting global company in connection with strategy to trace the supply chain of a newly acquired entity with operations and suppliers in Xinjiang, China.</li><li>Accountability Mechanisms. Assisting financial institutions in connection with developing accountability mechanisms for individuals in local communities who face human rights impacts as a result of projects in which they invest to seek information and potential redress.</li><li>Policy Refresh. Assist global company in connection with developing and enhancing both internal and external-facing ESG-related policies (addressing human rights, anti-corruption, AML, DE&I, and other related topics).</li></ul><h5>Investigations and Risk Assessments</h5><ul><li>Asia-Pacific FCPA Investigation. Conducting review of potential payment issues in India and other Asia-Pacific countries for a leading technology company.</li><li>False Claims Act/Fraud Investigation. Representing special committee of Board of Directors in connection with government investigation and internal investigation regarding potential fraudulent transactions and false claims act violations.</li><li>Global FCPA Investigation. Represented a Fortune 500 company in an internal investigation of potential FCPA violations in Latin American and Asia-Pacific countries.</li><li>Asia-Pacific FCPA Investigation. Represented a leading global technology company in an internal investigation of potential FCPA violations in Asia-Pacific countries.</li><li>Global Risk Assessment. Assisted a technology company with significant international operations in conducting an anti-corruption risk assessment and is currently assisting the company with updating its policies, procedures, and training plan to reflect learnings from the assessment.</li><li>Global Risk Assessment. Represented a Fortune 500 company with significant operations in Asia and Latin America in conducting an anti-corruption risk assessment. Following the risk assessment, assisted with development of global compliance program, including developing policies and training, and procedures for screening third parties.</li></ul><h5>FCPA Due Diligence</h5><ul><li>Global Anti-Corruption Due Diligence. Represented a leading technology company in connection with anti-corruption due diligence of a U.S.-based target with significant operations in Asia and the Middle East.</li><li>FCPA Diligence of Medical Device Company. Represented a global medical device company in connection with anti-corruption diligence of a target with global operations.</li><li>Global Anti-Corruption Due Diligence. Represented a global technology company in connection with anti-corruption due diligence of a UK-based target with substantial business in Europe, Russia, India, Asia, and Latin America.</li><li>Global Anti-Corruption Due Diligence. Represented a Fortune 500 company in connection with anti-corruption diligence of an Africa-based target with significant operations in Africa and the Middle East.</li><li>Post-Acquisition FCPA/Compliance Review. Represented a Fortune 100 company with a post-acquisition anti-corruption compliance review of a newly acquired business with operations and significant government touch points in Russia, Eastern Europe, Northern Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East.</li></ul>

Stacey Sprenkel

ESG + Sustainability

Public Company Advisory & Governance

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MoFo ESG + GCs: Practices, Priorities and Perspectives

22 Jun 2023 9:00 AM - 10:30 AM PDT

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