PracticePro

Date: Friday, March 17, 2023, 12 – 7:30 PM PST

Location: Latham & Watkins LLP, 505 Montgomery Street, #2000, San Francisco, CA 94111

Do you want to gain the knowledge and exact formula for securing a great summer associate position or post-graduate career? Master the substantive and soft skills and competencies you will need during your summer internships to deliver stellar work product, build a fantastic brand, and receive a permanent employment offer? Would you like to be part of an exclusive group of students participating in recruiting opportunities with PracticePro’s law firm partners?

TARGET AUDIENCE

The conference is best suited for 1Ls and 2Ls. Incoming 1Ls, 3Ls, and LLMs may also attend.

CONFERENCE STRUCTURE 

The Conference is a half-day (12 – 5 pm PST) event on March 17, 2023, taught by speakers and instructors from top law firms and corporate legal departments. The Conference concludes with a recruiting reception (5:30 – 7:30 pm PST).    

Conference registrants will also be invited to participate in our:

• Live 4-part summer webinar series focused on business frameworks, professional branding, strategic career planning, advanced networking and interviewing techniques, and other topics in summer 2023. The webinars will also be available for on-demand viewing.
• Exclusive virtual job fair, resume collection, and networking receptions with our law firm partners in spring and summer 2023.
• Early registrants also receive a complimentary 50-minute customized career/OCI coaching session, valued at $350.

Tuition includes the Career Conference and Recruiting Reception, the summer webinar series, exclusive summer networking receptions with our partner firms, resume collection, and the virtual job fair. Early registrants also receive a complimentary 50-minute customized career/OCI coaching session, valued at $350.

$249 = Early Registration (ends January 3, 2023 at 11:59 PM PT, subject to availability)

$349 = Regular Registration 

Register on our website here or faster on the Eventbrite page here.

INSTRUCTORS & SPEAKERS

Niki Khoshzamir, PracticePro 

Niki Khoshzamir is the Chief Executive Officer of PracticePro, an EdTech social enterprise that provides skills training, coaching, and scholarships to empower the next generation of attorneys. In her role, she leads all business and legal aspects of the company including corporate governance, IP portfolio, product development, and strategic partnerships.

Prior to founding PracticePro, Niki was an attorney at the global firms of Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale & Dorr, LLP, and Kirkland and Ellis, LLP. She focused her practice on intellectual property litigation, complex commercial disputes, and trade sanctions compliance. Niki successfully represented companies and individuals in federal and state courts, and in all stages of litigation including trial. She was the first recipient of the firm’s Pickering Fellowship on the West Coast through which she helped spearhead the Advancing Justice – Asian Law Caucus’ advocacy and community education project on U.S. sanctions on Iran.

Niki currently serves on the national advisory board of the Iranian American Bar Association (IABA), and is the former president of the Northern California Chapter, which she founded in 2006. She also serves on the Leadership Council of Advancing Justice – Asian Law Caucus. From 2011 to 2017, Niki was a Lecturer at Law at the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law.

Niki received her B.S. in Biology, summa cum laude, from Texas Southern University, and a J.D. and Certificate in Law and Technology from Berkeley Law. Prior to her legal career, she was a research assistant at the MD Anderson Cancer Center and the Baylor College of Medicine Human Genome Sequencing Center. Niki grew up in Tehran, London, and Vienna and immigrated to the United States on her own at 19 to attend college. She is fluent in Farsi and English, and proficient in German.

Samir Abdelnour, Hanson Bridgett

As Hanson Bridgett’s Director of Pro Bono and Social Impact, Samir Abdelnour oversees the firm’s pro bono, community service, and charitable giving programs. Samir also works with outside organizations and internal firm stakeholders to advance the firm’s environmental sustainability and impact investing goals. Samir is a member of the Association of Pro Bono Counsel and the Executive Committee of the California Lawyers Association Environmental Law Section. He is also a member of the firm’s Pro Bono Committee, Recruiting Committee, and RACE Task Force.

Samir’s legal practice focuses on environmental litigation, advice, and counseling in regulatory enforcement actions, contaminated property remediation, land use entitlement and permit proceedings, water rights, product labeling, and state and federal court litigation involving natural resources and other environmental issues. Samir’s environmental law expertise includes a broad range of state and federal environmental and land use laws, including the Clean Water Act (CWA), Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA), Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), Porter-Cologne Water Quality Control Act, Carpenter-Presley-Tanner Hazardous Substance Account Act, and California’s Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986 (“Proposition 65”).

Samir received his B.A. with honors from the University of Texas at Austin and graduated cum laude from the University of California College of the Law, San Francisco (formerly UC Hastings).

Nancy Allred, Airbnb

Nancy Allred is an Associate General Counsel, Product, at Airbnb, Inc., where her team advises on a wide variety of online products and offline programs designed to improve the travel experience by supporting Airbnb’s Hosts and guests. She co-chairs the Airbnb Legal Department’s global DEI program, overseeing outside counsel diversity plans, diverse pipelines initiatives, and team inclusion and belonging projects.

Nancy currently sits on the board of directors for Asian Women’s Shelter, a San Francisco-based nonprofit dedicated to eliminating domestic violence by promoting the social, economic and political self-determination of women. She also serves as a member of the Silicon Valley Chapter Leadership of ChIPs, a 501(c)(3) advancing and connecting women in law, tech, and policy. 

In prior roles, Nancy has counseled companies in the technology, transportation, and energy sectors in varying roles as a product, regulatory, and litigation counsel.

Nancy received her B.A. with high honors from the University of California, Berkeley, and her J.D. from Columbia Law School, where she was a Harlan Fiske Stone scholar.

Alexis Amezcua, Morrison Foerster

Alexis Amezcua is a litigation partner at Morrison and Foerster and is based in San Francisco. She has extensive experience in class actions and complex commercial litigation. Alexis is a skilled class action and commercial litigator, and practices in a variety of high-profile areas. She represents both plaintiffs and defendants, and her practice includes substantive trial experience in both state and federal court, as well as arbitration proceedings.

Alexis has extensive experience in representing clients in complex, mass consumer class actions, along with federal MDL proceedings and state court-coordinated proceedings involving various state unfair competition and deceptive trade practices laws. She also regularly counsels clients about pre-litigation strategy, product launches, and risk management in various contexts, including government investigations.

Alexis has demonstrated a long-standing commitment to diversity and inclusion as a founding member of the Latinx and Women of Color affinity groups. She serves as Co-chair of the firm’s Diversity Strategy Committee and was the former Hiring Partner for the San Francisco office. She is involved in the community and is a former board member of the Bar Association of San Francisco. She is presently a board member of California ChangeLawyers, an organization focused on diversifying California’s legal profession.

Alexis received her B.A, at Columbia University, and earned her J.D. at Stanford Law School.

Brian Cabrera, Quantum (KEYNOTE)

Brian Cabrera is a senior tech industry executive from Silicon Valley. He serves as Chief Administrative Officer at Quantum Corporation, helping the world’s leading organizations and governments to power visual data innovation and creativity while keeping them safe and cyber secure. He is responsible for all legal, human resources, regulatory, and compliance operations of the company. Mr. Cabrera most recently served as Assistant United States Attorney in the Criminal Division of the Northern California federal prosecutor’s office working on behalf of agencies such as the FBI, Secret Service, ATF, NASA and NCIS. Prior to this appointment Brian was the Senior Vice President & General Counsel for NVIDIA, a Fortune 500 company synonymous with graphics, machine learning and artificial intelligence, today valued at over $400 Billion.

Brian has been honored with a Legend in Law award as one of the nation’s top ten general counsel by the U.S. Library of Congress Burton Awards/American Bar Association. He has been named a Top 25 Leading General Counsel in California by The Daily Journal and has been recognized by the Law Foundation of Silicon Valley with its Innovation Award. He was most recently honored as 2022 Man of Distinction by Legal Momentum for his career in service to diversity and inclusion in the legal profession. Brian is a sought-after speaker and commentator on topics related to technology, diversity, leadership, compliance, governance, litigation, legal and financial affairs, and executive management; he has shared his insights in The Wall Street Journal and on National Public Radio, as well as other leading media outlets, and has been described as a “top-notch innovator” by the National Law Journal.

Prior to joining NVIDIA, Brian spent eight years at Synopsys, Inc., as their SVP, General Counsel, Corporate Secretary & Chief Ethics and Compliance Officer, at Callidus Software, where he took the company public as SVP & GC in 2003, at PeopleSoft, as Chief Operations Counsel, and at Netscape as their first Corporate Affairs and Strategic Alliances Counsel. He has also worked at Silicon Graphics Inc., Bronson, Bronson & McKinnon, and the California Attorney General’s Office.

Brian sits on the Board of Directors of KQED and is a Senior Fellow with the American Leadership Forum – Silicon Valley.  He has been a member of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute Advisory Committee, President of the Law Foundation of Silicon Valley, a lecturer at Stanford Law School, and on the Board of Governors at USC Law. He is fluent in English and Spanish and has also studied French and Mandarin.

Brian holds both Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from the University of Southern California, a Diploma Superior from Universidad Javeriana in Colombia, as well as a Juris Doctorate from the USC Law School. He has earned certificates in Finance from the University of Oxford’s Said Business School, Board Governance from Stanford Law School, and Executive Management from UC Berkeley Business School.

He lives in Silicon Valley with his three children.

Taylor Gooch, WilmerHale

Taylor Gooch is counsel in the San Francisco office of WilmerHale and focuses on complex and high-stakes intellectual property and patent litigation matters. Taylor has represented clients in US district courts, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, and the US International Trade Commission. Taylor has also counseled clients and assisted with matters before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, including inter partes review proceedings. His cases have involved a wide array of technologies including solid state memory, telecom, computer graphics, video streaming, life science technologies, and many more. Taylor routinely represents clients ranging from small startups to Fortune 50 companies in the microprocessor, video, cable, and life sciences spaces.

Prior to joining WilmerHale, Taylor was an associate at Keker, Van Nest and Peters, where he represented clients in matters relating to commercial class actions, privacy law, attorney malpractice, shareholder suits and patent claims in district court, the ITC, and private arbitration. Previously, he was a law clerk for the Honorable Sharon Prost of the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit and the Honorable Richard Andrews of the United States District Court for the District of Delaware.

Taylor earned his B.S. in Biology and History from the University of Oregon and his J.D. from the University of Pennsylvania Law School.

Cindy Guan, Latham & Watkins

Cindy Guan is an associate in the San Francisco office of Latham & Watkins and a member of the firm’s Litigation & Trial Department. 

Cindy represents global public and private companies, senior officers, and directors in all stages of securities and complex commercial litigation, including pre-litigation and product counseling. These companies span numerous industries, including technology, cryptocurrency, consumer retail, software, semiconductors, and financial services. 

While at Latham, Cindy was seconded to a global technology client’s litigation team. 

As part of Cindy’s active pro bono practice, she has successfully reduced a client’s criminal sentence, eliminated another client’s bail bond debt, and advised non-profits in policy and advocacy work regarding access to justice issues. 

Cindy is a member of the firm’s Recruiting Committee and has led the San Francisco Asian & Middle Eastern Lawyers Group.

Cindy received her B.A. from the Stanford University and her J.D. from Harvard Law School.

Alexis Higgs, Alston & Bird

Alexis Higgs is counsel in the Los Angeles office of Alston & Bird and a member of the firm’s Finance Group. She focuses on advising corporate trust clients on a wide variety of capital markets transactions, including structured finance and debt offerings. Before joining the firm, Alexis represented issuers and underwriters in commercial mortgaged-backed securitizations at a major New York law firm.

Alexis represents major financial institutions as master servicer, trustee, paying agent, securities administrator, disbursement agent, escrow agent, and custodian on public and private CMBS, ABS, and RMBS transactions, including new securitizations, terminations, amendments, repurchase facilities, escrow arrangements, and custodial arrangements. Alexis is also named in The Best Lawyers in America© “Ones to Watch” for banking and finance law.

Alexis earned a B.A. in both history and international studies from Yale University where she was also a four-year letter winning member of the Division I Women’s Swimming and Diving Team. She earned her J.D. and an LL.M. in international and comparative law from the Duke University School of Law.

Brian Kwok, Haynes and Boone

A partner at Haynes and Boone, Brian Kwok helps clients build, manage, and successfully monetize patent portfolios. Brian evaluates patent portfolios and negotiates deals ranging from a few hundred thousand to many billions of dollars. He recently represented an international technology company in a multi-billion dollar patent portfolio acquisition involving thousands of patents related to wireless telecommunications, cellular systems, and consumer electronics.

Brian also counsels clients through pre-litigation conflicts to resolve assertions and licensing disputes before patent litigation ensues. When patent disputes mature into formal litigations, Brian has significant experience with patent matters before the International Trade Commission and numerous federal district courts. Brian’s practice also includes representing clients in inter partes review and post-grant review proceedings before the U.S. Patent Office’s Patent Trial and Appeal Board as part of a comprehensive litigation strategy.

Brian was selected for inclusion in Northern California Super Lawyers – Rising Stars Edition, Thomson Reuters, 2014-2016. He was also named in the 2020 Lawyers of Color Power List which highlights the nation’s most influential minority attorneys and non-minority diversity advocates. Outside of his legal practice, Brian is a member of the Board of Directors for Leela International, a non-profit that builds playgrounds and art education programs for children in underprivileged communities around the world.

Brian received his B.S. with distinction in chemical engineering from the University of Illinois, and graduated from the University of Wisconsin Law School, magna cum laude.

Luke Liss, Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati

Luke Liss is the Pro Bono Partner of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati and is based in the Palo Alto office. He manages the firm’s global pro bono efforts, including serving as the primary contact for client requests for pro bono partnerships and developing collaborative relationships with nonprofit service providers. Luke also leads pro bono litigation and immigration teams.

Luke has also played a key leadership role in recent successful high-profile pro bono litigation, including a trial win on behalf of one of the largest classes of Medicare patients in history in 2020 (Alexander v. Cochran, No. 3:11-cv-1703 (D. Conn), recently affirmed by a Second Circuit panel), and a historic win on summary judgment against a former Colombian paramilitary warlord on behalf of family members of a murdered community activist in 2021 (Jaramillo v. Naranjo, No. 1:10-cv-21951 (S.D. Fla.)). 

Luke currently serves as a member of the firm’s Hiring Committee, Recruiting Committee, Community Service Committee, and Pro Bono Committee. He is particularly active in firm diversity initiatives, mentoring inside and outside the firm, and is also a leader of the firm’s Black Affinity Group.

Luke received his B.A., cum laude, in Political Science from the University of Oregon and graduated from Stanford Law School.

Andrew Nizamian, Paul Hastings

Andrew Nizamian is an associate in the San Francisco office at Paul Hastings and is a member of the Corporate Department. He focuses his practice on capital markets and financial technology, with an emphasis on cryptocurrency legal issues and securities regulation. Andrew has advised top global digital-asset trading platforms and developers regarding digital- asset listings, purchases and sales of digital assets, offerings of equity and token rights, executive compensation, regulatory concerns and traditional corporate work.

Andrew received a B.A. in Economics from Brown University and a J.D. from NYU School of Law.

Sarah Ray, Latham & Watkins

Sarah Ray, Deputy Managing Partner of the Bay Area Offices and immediate past Co-Chair of Latham & Watkins’ Bay Area Litigation & Trial Department, helps clients navigate complex commercial and antitrust litigation matters. Drawing on successful experience at all stages of litigation, she guides clients from the inception and investigation of a dispute working to identify and develop a strategy to win at the earliest possible stage of litigation, or if necessary, at trial. She has developed particular experience in class action litigation and claims of unfair competition, recently winning three Top Defense Verdicts in four years.

Sarah has significant experience as lead trial counsel in federal and state courts defending corporations against antitrust and unfair competition allegations as well as handling issues at the intersection of competition and complex commercial litigation.

Specifically, she navigates cases related to monopolization and attempted monopolization, price-fixing, tying, refusal to deal, fraud, theft of trade secrets, patent misuse, and unfair competition. She has a particular ability to distill complex issues and develop a compelling narrative for presentation at trial.

As a current member of the firm’s Diversity Leadership Committee and Co-Chair of Latham’s Women Enriching Business (WEB) Committee from 2014 to March 2019, she was instrumental in developing a local and global committee structure and in creating global programming to promote women through trailblazing initiatives focused on women’s professional development, mentoring, and networking

Sarah received her B.A. from the Duke University and her J.D. from UC Berkeley School of Law where she was Order of the Coif.

Jeremy Taylor, Baker Botts

Jeremy Taylor is a partner at Baker Botts. He works closely with high-tech clients on intellectual property disputes and counseling. By developing deep relationships with technology companies in the San Francisco Bay Area and across the country, Jeremy understands the goals of his clients and works to solve IP disputes accordingly. In addition to handling active lawsuits, as a trained engineer Jeremy understands the needs of his clients and their respective industries allowing him to proactively identify emerging legal issues and minimize risks in future intellectual property disputes. In 2016, Jeremy helped open the San Francisco office of Baker Botts.

Jeremy represents clients in courts and administrative agencies across the country. His experience handling complex, multi-jurisdictional disputes through jury verdicts and appeal allows him to handle disputes as efficiently as possible while ensuring each case is trial-ready. He has helped many clients with patent litigations lasting just a few months but has also helped clients with matters through jury verdicts and subsequent appeals. His ability to effectively balance litigation costs against the need for a robust trial defense sets him apart in the legal industry. He has substantial experience in asserting intellectual property against infringing competitors as well as challenging intellectual property in the courts and patent office.

Jeremy received his B.S.E., magna cum laude in Mechanical Engineering & Mathematics from Walla Walla University. He received his J.D. from New York University School of Law.

Elica Vafaie, Lawyer’s Committee for Civil Rights

Elica Vafaie is the Interim Executive Director at the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area, one of the oldest civil rights organizations on the West Coast dedicated to dismantling systems of racism and oppression and building a more equitable society through Economic, Immigrant, and Racial justice programs. She oversees a team advancing direct services, policy, and impact litigation leveraging a network of over 1,000 pro bono volunteers.

Prior to working at LCCRSF, Elica was a Staff Attorney and Program Manager of the National Security & Civil Rights Program at Advancing Justice- Asian Law Caucus where she advanced the civil rights of Arab, Middle Eastern, Muslim, and South Asian communities. She was a rapid response attorney at the SFO airport in the wake of the 2017 Muslim Ban securing the release of clients after 30+ hours of detention by CBP. During her tenure she led several rapid response efforts as the team represented hundreds of individuals impacted by the Ban, provided testimony to commissions, led attorney MCLE trainings, and part of the co-counsel team on Pars v. Pompeo, a class action lawsuit challenging the unlawful implementation of the Ban.

She has also worked at the University of California Immigrant Legal Services Center, the California Community Foundation, and California Rural Legal Assistance.

Elica is a Commissioner on the California Access to Justice Commission. She has served on the boards of the Legal Aid Foundation of California and the Iranian American Bar Association, Northern California Chapter.

She received a J.D. from the University of California, Davis School of Law and her B.A. from University of California, Irvine.