Recent Placements
Rarified Air
For over 20 years, CenterPeak’s founders have been the driving force behind the most significant office openings, group acquisitions and partner placements across the United States. We’ve placed over 2,000 partners and opened more than 40 offices for Am Law 50 firms, with combined practices worth billions of dollars.
Selected Recent Placements
Franz Ranero and James Smallwood will join the London office as partners in the Structured Finance Practice. Highly regarded in their field, Mr. Ranero and Mr. Smallwood regularly advise investment funds, financial institutions, and asset managers on a variety of complex, cross-border structured finance and structured products transactions, with a particular focus on collateralized loan obligations (CLOs) and bespoke funding solutions.
Rob DeConti joined King & Spalding as a partner in its government matters and regulation practice group in Washington. Mr. DeConti joins from Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General, where he was chief counsel and deputy inspector general. At HHS, he led the office that serves as the HHS liaison to the Justice Department for all health-care enforcement actions under the False Claims Act and enforced HHS’s health-care fraud remedies, such as program exclusion and the negotiation of Corporate Integrity Agreements.
Danielle Naftulin joined Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati as a partner in its corporate department in Palo Alto, Calif., the firm announced Tuesday. Ms. Naftulin advises emerging companies and venture investors on issues and transactions. She guides clients through venture capital financings, mergers and acquisitions, recapitalizations, spinouts, and general corporate matters. She also helps companies navigate initial public offerings and strategic transactions, the firm said.
David Perkins relocates after spending nearly two decades at a Wall Street firm representing clients such as American Securities and ECN Capital. He advised federal contractor Amentum on its 2023 merger with Jacobs’ Critical Mission Solutions and Cyber and Intelligence businesses to create a public company with $13 billion in revenue. Mr. Perkins works on all aspects of private equity investments across multiple asset classes, including M&A, investment funds, joint ventures, minority and other structured investments, restructurings and large-scale real estate acquisitions and dispositions.
Paul Astolfi and Katy McNeil joined A&O Shearman as partners in its energy, natural resources, and infrastructure practice. Astolfi advises institutional investors, banks, and debt providers on energy transition matters, particularly renewables. He specializes in finance, mergers and acquisitions, reorganizations, and cross-border transactions involving renewable energy projects, power plants, and project bond financings. McNeil focuses on domestic renewable energy, solar asset-backed securities, and structured finance in the solar commercial and industrial space. She advises financial institutions, institutional investors, and developers on project finance, acquisition and divestitures of infrastructure and energy assets, and tax credit monetization.
Sidley Austin has expanded its products liability and mass torts bench with the addition of Sarah Carlson in the firm's newly minted San Diego office. At Sidley, Ms. Carlson will lead the consumer product safety regulatory practice and will be an integral member of Sidley’s product liability and mass torts practice.
The Federal Aviation Administration's former chief counsel Marc Nichols has joined DLA Piper in Washington, D.C., as partner and co-chair of its transportation practice. Mr. Nichols joins DLA Piper with more than 25 years of public- and private-sector experience, including serving as in-house counsel for international heavyweights in the aerospace, defense and technology industries.
Mathew Eapen joins Sidley Austin as a partner in its Investment Funds practice. Mr. Eapen’s practice focuses on advising private investment funds, particularly venture capital, growth equity, and technology- and health care-focused funds, and emerging companies on all aspects of their business, including capital raising, investment activity, and other operational and transactional matters.