Louis Lehot
Louis Lehot is a partner and business lawyer with Foley & Lardner LLP, based in the firm’s Silicon Valley, San Francisco and Los Angeles offices, where he is a member of the Private Equity & Venture Capital, M&A and Transactions Practices as well as the Technology, Health Care, Life Sciences and Energy Industry Teams. Louis focuses his practice on advising entrepreneurs and their management teams, investors and financial advisors at all stages of growth, from garage to global. Louis especially enjoys being able to help his clients achieve hyper-growth, go public and to successfully obtain optimal liquidity events.
To assist his clients in realizing their objectives, Louis brings to bear a broad array of legal and business instruments, processes and strategies, from formation to liquidity. He guides emerging private companies as they secure venture capital financing, prepare for IPO or de-SPAC, and navigate the exit. His domain experience in public offerings and private placements of equity, equity-linked, and debt securities, mergers, acquisitions, dispositions, spinoffs, strategic investments, and joint ventures, as well as corporate governance and securities law compliance matters, serves his clients well. Additionally, Louis regularly represents US and non-US registrants before the SEC, FINRA, NYSE and NASDAQ.
Prior to joining Foley, Louis was the founder of a Silicon Valley boutique law firm called L2 Counsel. He previously served as both the co-managing partner and co-chair of the emerging growth and venture capital practice of a global law firm in Silicon Valley. With a legal career in New York, London, Paris, and Silicon Valley spanning more than 20 years, Louis has worked in technology, health care, clean energy, and other innovative industries, leveraging the latest legal technology tools to drive strategies and solutions that make sense.
"Louis Lehot is known for the high quality of his advice, his responsiveness and passion for his clients."
- Business Law
- Business Finance, Mergers & Acquisitions, Partnership & Shareholder Disputes
- Corporate Lawyer
- California
- State Bar of California
- ID Number: 242310
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- Georgetown Univ
- Undergraduate Degree
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- Boston College Law School
- Law Degree
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- California State Bar # 242310
- Member
- - Current
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"How to Choose an Investment Banker" by Louis Lehot
In this #askasiliconvalleylawyer #videoblog, Silicon Valley lawyer Louis Lehot, partner at Foley & Lardner LLP and formerly the founder of L2 Counsel, provides his experiences and insights on how to select an investment banker for your startup to help guide you through the M&A process. Like with all advisors, Louis shares his recommendations on how to pick an investment banker that has experience and expertise in your industry vertical.
Capitalization Tables and Proforma by Louis Lehot
In this #askasiliconvalleylawyer #videoblog, Silicon Valley lawyers Louis Lehot, partner at Foley & Lardner LLP and formerly the founder of L2 Counsel & partner at Foley, and Nicole Hatcher, co-founder of Allen & Hatcher, describe what is a capitalization table, how to prepare it, how to manage it, and best practices to protect your startup. They then discuss the use of a “pro forma” cap table to understand who gets what in a venture capital or other financing.
Founder Equity by Louis Lehot
In this #askasiliconvalleylawyer #videoblog, Silicon Valley lawyer Louis Lehot, partner at Foley & Lardner LLP & formerly the founder of L2 Counsel, shares his advice for founders on how to issue founders’ stock at formation, how to split it up, and how to vest it over time.
Louis Lehot | Stock options
In this #askasiliconvalleylawyer #videoblog, Silicon Valley lawyer Louis Lehot, partner at Foley & Lardner LLP and formerly the founder of L2 Counsel, provides an overview for entrepreneurs, C-suite executives and investors about key decisions to make in adopting stock plans and how to incentivize employees with stock options.
