Paul Hastings, a leading global law firm, announced today that it represented Lotte Chemical Corporation (“Lotte”), a member company of the Lotte Group and previously known as Honam Petrochemical, in a significant trade secrets litigation victory in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Alabama Northern Division.

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In a move to greatly strengthen its IP practice and better serve its clients, international law firm Duane Morris has opened a new office in Palo Alto.  The technology center was a logical step for the firm’s growing intellectual property litigation practice group.

The office will be managed by partner Karineh Khachatourian, who was recruited from K&L Gates.  She brings along one additional associate attorney to the firm, Patrick Salceda.  The pair bring stong experience in all manner of IP litigation work, including patents, trade secrets, trademarks, licensing, and enforcement.  They primarily serve clients in the software and video gaming industry so prominent in Silicon Valley.

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Cooley LLP announced today that it represented Epocrates, Inc. in its $293 million sale to athenahealth, Inc., a provider of electronic health records systems. The deal is expected to close in the second quarter of 2013.

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Duane Morris LLP announced today that it has opened an office in Palo Alto, California, with the addition of prominent IP litigatorKarineh Khachatourian, who will serve as managing partner of the new office. Khachatourian joins the firm from K&L Gates LLP. The move allows Duane Morris to provide more efficient and direct service to clients throughout Silicon Valley and enhances its capabilities in California and nationally.

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There were some major Silicon Valley legal job changes in the month of December.  Here is the run-down of the most prominent:

Foley and Lardner hired attorney Frederic Adam for its Tax group.  The partner joins from KPMG and brings 18 years of experience to Foley.  Adam is a graduate of the University of Denver College of Law and holds an LLM in tax from NYU.

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Simpson Thacher represented Igloo Holdings Corporation (“Igloo”) in connection with its Rule 144A and Regulation S offering of $350 million aggregate principal amount of 8.25%/9.00% Senior PIK Toggle Notes due 2017. Igloo intends to use the net proceeds from any such placement, together with $100.0 million of cash on hand of Interactive Data Corporation, to pay a dividend to its shareholders and a distribution to its optionholders totalling approximately $439.0 million.

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Simpson Thacher recently represented the underwriter, Citigroup Global Markets Inc., in a public offering of 21,490,022 ordinary shares of Avago Technologies Limited by several of Avago’s shareholders for aggregate gross proceeds of approximately $740 million.

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Foley announced today that Frederic J. Adam (“Fred”) has joined the firm’s Tax & Individual Planning Practice as a partner in its Silicon Valley office. Prior to joining Foley, Fred was a tax partner in the International Corporate Tax group of KPMG LLP.

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International law firm Dorsey & Whitney announced today that Scott Smith, M.D., J.D. has joined the Patent and Life Sciences practice groups in the Firm’s Palo Alto office as a Partner. Mr. Smith brings twelve years of experience as a patent attorney focused on the medical device industry. His clients range from the pre-funded garage stage to venture backed start-ups to publicly traded companies. Having served as a former in-house counsel at several successful medical device companies, Mr. Smith has extensive experience in patent procurement, portfolio management, due diligence preparation, freedom-to-operate and patentability evaluations, and the setup and management of in-house patent programs.

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DLA Piper today announced that Dharmesh Pandya has joined the firm’s Tax practice as a partner in the Silicon Valley office.

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