headquarters silicon valley center mountain view california no . of attorneys 300 1 major practice areas corporate litigation tax intellectual property labor and employment 1 revenue 327 million 2015 1 profit per equity partner 1.5 million 2015 1 date founded 1972 company type limited liability partnership website http www.fenwick.com fenwick & west llp is a law firm of more than 300 attorneys with offices in silicon valley san francisco seattle new york city and shanghai . the firm s practice focuses on technology companies and start ups . 2 fenwick s lawyers are divided among four primary practice groups with numerous subgroups within each corporate litigation tax and intellectual property . it is ranked as one of the 100 largest law firms in the united states and is one of the most prestigious and selective law firms according to american lawyer magazine . 1 fenwick has worked on a variety of high profile matters for clients such as facebook google uber fitbit dropbox apple whatsapp and cisco . in 2008 ip business & law listed fenwick as one of only 20 go to law firms on the cutting edge of patent litigation 3 and in 2011 global law experts named fenwick & west the 1 antitrust law firm . 4 larry kramer dean of stanford law school told bloomberg businessweek that fenwick is one of the great indigenous firms of silicon valley noting that the firm understands how the valley works better than most everything from how to raise money where to incorporate and how to nurture and grow a startup . 2 prior to taking facebook public in 2012 5 american lawyer said fenwick s work was critical in allowing the social media company to stay private for so long . the firm s patent prosecution team brought facebook in as an intellectual property client a few months before their corporate colleagues in 2007 . 6 where many big firms have eschewed patent prosecution as commodity work that goes to the lowest bidder fenwick has embraced it as central to the mission of its technology and life sciences clients and start ups whose small ip portfolios can be the crown jewels of their business . 6 contents 1 milestones 1.1 2014 1.2 2013 1.3 2012 1.4 2011 1.5 2010 1.6 2000 2 clients 3 references 4 external links milestones edit 2014 edit fenwick represents whatsapp in its 16 billion acquisition by facebook 7 2013 edit fenwick announces a new version of the series seed documents on github curated by fenwick partner ted wang . 8 2012 edit fenwick is the 1 issuer adviser on ipos both globally and in the united states ; in the u.s. the firm handled 41 percent of the ipo market by volume and globally fenwick handled 17 percent 9 fenwick represents facebook in its 1 billion purchase of instagram 10 fenwick represents facebook in its ipo the largest internet ipo in u.s. history 5 11 2011 edit pro bono counsel to democratic underground in righthaven llc v. democratic underground llc which is widely regarded as a legal victory against copyright trolls 12 13 14 15 and called copyright case of the year by managing intellectual property 16 2010 edit fenwick partner ralph pais creates flex by fenwick 2 17 2000 edit handles verisign s 21 billion acquisition of network solutions the largest internet merger in history 2 18 clients edit apple computer apple was a very early client of the firm ; the firm advised steve jobs and steve wozniak on the incorporation of the company and also advised apple on the creation of the first shrinkwrap license agreement in 1976 . 19 amazon.com fenwick defended the 1 click patent for amazon . 19 ebay fenwick advised ebay on its ipo . 19 facebook in 2012 fenwick & west represented facebook in the largest tech ipo in history . 5 11 fenwick also advised facebook on its acquisition of instagram in 2013 . 10 oracle fenwick advised oracle on its ipo . wang laboratories created the first clean room protocols for software which later became an industry standard to prevent ip infringement . 19 virgin america fenwick advised the airline on its initial rounds of debt and equity financing in 2007 . 20 references edit a b c d e fenwick & west . alm media llc . retrieved september 2 2013 . a b c d stone brad april 7 2011 . why techies like to friend fenwick & west businessweek . bloomberg businessweek . retrieved march 11 2012 . http www.fenwick.com services practices pages intellectual property.aspx fenwick named 2011 california antitrust law firm of the year press release . fenwick & west . october 7 2011 . retrieved march 2 2014 . a b c fenwick & west and simpson thacher lead as facebook takes us listing . a b ross todd june 2012 . knocking out the competition how fenwick & west won the world s most high profile ipo pdf . the american lawyer . rosen ellen february 20 2014 . weil advises facebook as whatsapp uses fenwick business of law . bloomberg . bloomberg lp . retrieved march 1 2014 . kolodny lora june 3 2013 . seeking seed funding open source forms might cut legal bill . venturewire . retrieved november 4 2013 . bloomberg 2012 global legal advisor league tables pdf . bloomberg . bloomberg lp . january 2 2012 . retrieved march 1 2014 . a b facebook to buy instagram for 1 billion in biggest acquisition yet . amlaw daily . april 9 2012 . retrieved september 2 2013 . a b facebook will have the biggest tech ipo ever raising 16 billion with 38 share price . techcrunch . may 17 2012 . retrieved march 2 2014 . masnick mike judge rules that righthaven lawsuit was a sham ; threatens sanctions . june 14 2011 . green steve ruling that righthaven misled court likely to be felt in other cases . july 14 2011 . anderson nate righthaven learning it can t change the facts after it sues . july 14 2011 opsahl kurt righthaven ordered to pay 5 000 in sanctions for its misrepresentations to court . july 15 2011 . north america awards winners revealed . managing intellectual property . march 29 2012 . retrieved march 1 2014 . young eric october 3 2010 . fenwick s flex sweats the small stuff . http www.bizjournals.com . san francisco business times . retrieved march 1 2014 . external link in website help extending their domain alm media llc new york city april 2000 . a b c d history . fenwick & west llp . retrieved september 2 2013 . fenwick & west guides virgin s us entry . the lawyer . august 29 2007 . retrieved march 11 2012 . external links edit fenwick & west website retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title fenwick % 26 west & oldid 742842811 categories law firms of the united stateslaw in the san francisco bay arealaw firms established in 1972hidden categories cs1 errors external linksuse mdy dates from march 2014 navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage informationwikidata itemcite this page print export create a bookdownload as pdfprintable version languages add links this page was last modified on 6 october 2016 at 04 12 . text is available under the creative commons attribution sharealike license ; 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