Expanding V&E’s Antitrust and White Collar Practices on Both Coasts
May 3, 2011 — Antitrust lawyer Craig P. Seebald and white collar specialist and former federal prosecutor Matthew J. Jacobs today joined Vinson & Elkins as partners. Mr. Seebald joins V&E’s antitrust team in the firm’s Washington, D.C. office, and Mr. Jacobs will head up the firm’s complex commercial and white collar litigation in Northern California. Together, Mr. Jacobs and Mr. Seebald will expand the firm’s existing national antitrust and white collar practices. Both Mr. Seebald and Mr. Jacobs have extensive experience in the technology sector and will serve V&E clients in the United States and internationally.
“We are delighted to have these exceptional lawyers join us. Gaining trial lawyers such as Craig Seebald and Matt Jacobs with their strong national and international reputations for handling complex high-profile antitrust and white collar cases, particularly in the technology sector, enables us to significantly expand V&E’s national and international antitrust and competition practice,” stated Karl Stern, co-head of Vinson & Elkins’s 315-attorney Litigation Department.
“Craig’s experience representing international technology companies in important criminal antitrust matters, class actions, and monopolization litigation, and Matt’s white collar and complex commercial litigation expertise, nationally and specifically in Northern California, intersect ideally with V&E’s desire to enhance those capabilities for our clients on both coasts,” remarked Joe Dilg, V&E’s managing partner. “Bringing Craig and Matt to V&E further strengthens our firm’s ability to handle the entire gamut of antitrust matters for our clients, from mergers to investigations to litigation.”
About joining Vinson & Elkins, Craig Seebald commented: “Among the many attractions V&E held for us was the incredible opportunity to be affiliated with one of the great international law firms with one of the most impressive rosters of energy, technology, and transportation clients around the world. It provides a great platform for us with V&E’s deep presence in Asia and other international regions and its strong M&A, IP and existing antitrust capabilities. I welcome the opportunity to expand V&E’s antitrust practice on the East and West coasts and abroad.”
“I am tremendously excited to join Vinson & Elkins to help grow the practice in Northern California,” said Mr. Jacobs. “V&E has long been known for its incredibly strong institutional client base, which it has nurtured and grown through exceptional client service and lawyering at the highest levels of the profession. I am honored to be joining such a fine group of lawyers, and thrilled at the prospect of further expanding V&E’s reach into the West Coast and beyond.”
Mr. Seebald and Mr. Jacobs join Vinson & Elkins from McDermott Will & Emery, where Mr. Jacobs headed that firm’s White-Collar Criminal Defense group in Northern California. They have represented such clients as Hitachi Ltd., Renesas Technology, Brocade Communications, IDEXX Laboratories, Ariba Inc. and many other companies and individuals in significant white collar, antitrust and complex commercial litigations.
Vinson & Elkins is a global law firm with more than 770 lawyers across 14 offices on four continents. With a storied history in antitrust law, and nationally recognized as a top-tier antitrust practice, Vinson & Elkins’ 15 antitrust partners represent clients in mergers, acquisitions, joint ventures, government investigations and litigation across the country and around the world.
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BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION ON MESSRS SEEBALD AND JACOBS
Craig P. Seebald
Mr. Seebald’s antitrust practice includes defending companies in all aspects of antitrust. A principal area of Mr. Seebald’s practice involves defending companies involved in cartel and price fixing investigations. Mr. Seebald has successfully defended companies in grand jury investigations and coordinated the defense of multi-jurisdictional cartel investigations. He has also represented clients in obtaining amnesty from the Department of Justice. Mr. Seebald has successfully defended companies in state and federal class action cartel cases. Mr. Seebald also focuses on representing clients in antitrust matters involving intellectual property. He has litigated several antitrust cases involving and counseled clients regarding patent pools, licensing agreements, standard setting and the enforcement of invalid patents. Mr. Seebald has also successfully defended large-scale acquisitions, mergers, joint ventures and other collaborations before the Federal Trade Commission, Department of Justice and Department of Defense. Mr. Seebald holds his J.D. from The George Washington University Law School. He has been ranked by Chambers USA as an antitrust expert in D.C. and as one of America’s leading lawyers for business.
Matthew J. Jacobs
Mr. Jacobs is a former federal prosecutor in San Francisco who was widely reported to have been one of the leading candidates for nomination as U.S. Attorney in the Northern District of California during the current administration. Mr. Jacobs has nearly 20 years of trial experience handling white-collar defense, internal investigations and complex commercial litigation. He represents individuals and corporations in criminal and internal investigations involving the Department of Justice, the Securities & Exchange Commission and other governmental agencies, and has extensive experience in antitrust, health care fraud, securities, energy, environmental, and in criminal and civil forfeiture matters. As a prosecutor in the Northern District of California, Mr. Jacobs was the press spokesman for three U.S. Attorneys, and also served as lead counsel in several notable prosecutions involving securities fraud, health care fraud, energy trading, banking and international money laundering and was one of the prosecutors on the Enron case involving energy trading in California. Mr. Jacobs received the Justice Department’s Director’s Award and the FBI’s Director’s Award.
Mr. Jacobs serves on the federal Criminal Justice Act panel for the Northern District of California, representing indigent individuals in criminal cases on a pro bono basis, and also handles pro bono appeals for the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals. He is the former Chairman of the Steering Committee of the Criminal Justice Panel of the San Francisco Bar Association and serves on the Steering Committee of the Federal Bar Association. He has been recognized by local publications as one of the top lawyers in the Bay Area. Mr. Jacobs received his J.D. from Stanford Law School and clerked with the Honorable Walter J. Cummings on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in Chicago. Mr. Jacobs is also a former award-winning journalist in Shreveport, Louisiana, and earned a master’s degree from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University.
