Designing Equity Compensation and Employment Agreements for Startup and Emerging Growth Companies

Ms. Becking leads Orrick’s Global Employment & Equity Compensation practice; she is also integrated into the firm’s top-tier employment practice and compensation and benefits practice, enabling her to offer comprehensive solutions for the modern workplace.

Mr. Fosse leverages nearly three decades of experience to help his clients resolve their complex legal challenges relating to a wide range of compensation, benefits, and payroll matters. He works with publicly traded, private, nonprofit, and government clients in the design, implementation, and operation of domestic and international executive nonqualified and supplemental deferred compensation plans, as well as equity-based and other long-term incentive compensation arrangements. Mr. Fosse regularly assists clients in drafting and negotiating executive employment, retention, change in control, and severance agreements. He advises clients on handling employee benefit matters in corporate mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, initial public offerings, and other corporate transactions. Because of his depth of experience in executive compensation matters, Mr. Fosse is frequently retained to assist organizations in finding practical solutions or corrections for high-value potential failures to comply with tax rules. He is co-author of the treatise “Executive Compensation for Emerging Growth Companies” (4th edition) which is updated annually and published by Thomson Reuters.  

Mr. Mort focuses his practice on executive compensation and employee benefits matters and is well-known as a technical, creative, and business-oriented attorney. He advises high-growth companies and their leadership teams across the full corporate lifecycle—from formation through high-value strategic transactions and public company governance. Mr. Mort works extensively with both private and public companies, as well as founders, boards, and executive teams, in high-growth sectors including artificial intelligence, life sciences, software, crypto, and space and defense. His practice includes advising executives on their high-stakes employment agreements and within the context of strategic transactions. Mr. Mort's work spans a broad range of matters, including the design and implementation of equity incentive plans, executive compensation arrangements, and deferred compensation structures, as well as advising on compensation-related disclosures and proxy matters for public companies. He is also deeply involved in mergers and acquisitions, financings, and other strategic transactions.

Mr. Sandler advises multinational companies across all industry lines on a variety of employment-related matters and implementation of global equity compensation programs. He globally manages large multi-country and large multi-function HR projects.