Southern Career Conference

Niki Khoshzamir

PracticePro

Niki Khoshzamir is the Chief Executive Officer and Founder of PracticePro, an EdTech social enterprise dedicated to providing skills training, coaching, and scholarships to empower the next generation of attorneys. In her role, she oversees all business and legal aspects of the company, including corporate governance, intellectual property, product development, and strategic partnerships.

Before founding PracticePro, Niki was an attorney at Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale & Dorr LLP, where she specialized in intellectual property litigation, complex commercial disputes, and trade sanctions compliance. Niki successfully represented companies and individuals in federal and state courts, at all stages of litigation, including trial. Niki was also the first recipient of the firm’s Pickering Fellowship on the West Coast, through which she led the Asian Law Caucus’ community education and advocacy work on U.S. sanctions on Iran.

Niki is the founder and former president of the Northern California Chapter of the Iranian American Bar Association (IABA). She served as the first chapter representative on the national IABA Board of Directors (2007), National IABA Vice President (2008), and a member of the chapter’s board of directors (2006-2012). She currently serves on the National IABA Advisory Board and the Leadership Council of Asian Law Caucus. From 2011 to 2017, she was a Lecturer at Law at the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law (Berkeley Law).

Niki earned her J.D. from Berkeley Law and her B.S. in Biology, summa cum laude, from Texas Southern University. Prior to her legal career, she was a researcher at the Baylor College of Medicine Human Genome Sequencing Center and MD Anderson Cancer Center. She also holds an Advanced Genetics and Genomics Certificate from Stanford School of Medicine.

Niki grew up in Tehran, London, and Vienna, and immigrated to the United States at age 19 to attend college. Attending the American International High School in Vien

Dan Ankenman

Paul Hastings

Dan Ankenman is an associate in the Corporate department of Paul Hastings, LLP, and is based in the firm’s San Francisco office. He is a member of the Global Fintech & Payments Group and focuses on the representation of financial institutions and other financial services companies in various transactional, regulatory, and general corporate matters. Prior to joining Paul Hastings, Mr. Ankenman was a PracticePro Diversity Scholar, Class of 2023.

Mr. Ankenman received his B.A. from Brigham Young University, and he graduated magna cum laude from Brigham Young University Law School, where he was elected to the Order of the Coif and served as a Lead Note and Comment Editor for the BYU Law Review.

Nancy Allred

Airbnb

Nancy Chung Allred is an Associate General Counsel, Product, at Airbnb, Inc., where she leads a team providing strategic business counsel on a wide variety of online products and offline programs designed to improve the travel experience on Airbnb. Ms. Allred advises senior clients focused on supply growth, quality, and new business lines on product, consumer protection, employment, antitrust, marketing, and privacy issues. Ms. Allred 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, Ms. Allred has counseled companies in the technology, transportation, and energy sectors in varying roles as a product, regulatory, and litigation counsel.   

Ms. Allred 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. 

Brooks Beard

Omnissa

Brooks Beard is Senior Vice President and General Counsel at Omnissa and a member of Omnissa’s Executive Leadership Team. He drives the company’s legal strategy and—with his team—oversees the legal aspects of areas such as commercial and public sector sales, ethics and compliance, IP, cybersecurity, privacy, corporate governance, employment, litigation and M&A as well as government relations and public policy. Prior to joining Omnissa, Mr. Beard served as vice president and deputy general counsel at VMware. And before VMware, he was a partner in the San Francisco office of Morrison & Foerster after beginning his legal career in the Washington, DC office of Jones Day. In October 2007, then-San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom appointed Mr. Beard to serve as the Neutral Commissioner on the San Francisco Rent Stabilization and Arbitration Board—a position he held until 2013. And from 2009 until 2014, Mr. Beard sat on the Eco-Entrepreneurship Advisory Council and the Council of Legal Advisors at the Donald Bren School of Environmental Science Management, University of California at Santa Barbara. Mr. Beard is passionate about advancing diversity in the legal profession and developing young professionals into future leaders.  

Mr. Beard received his LL.M, with distinction, from the Georgetown University Law Center, his J.D., cum laude, from Vermont Law School and his B.A. from the University of California at Santa Barbara. 

Caitlin Caglia-Hilty

Morrison Foerster

Caitlin Caglia-Hilty is currently the Campus Recruiting Manager at Morrison & Foerster LLP. Over her six and a half years at the firm, she’s held multiple roles, including Senior Recruiting Specialist, Attorney Recruiting Specialist, Attorney Recruiting Coordinator, and Assistant. Ms. Caglia-Hilty also has been heavily involved in the Bay Area Recruitment Association (BALRA), where she served as Treasurer in 2022, and just completed her term as President of the organization. Throughout her professional tenure, she’s gained comprehensive knowledge of legal recruiting, with a specialty in entry level recruiting, campus engagement, and the candidate experience. 

Ms. Caglia-Hilty graduated from the University of Oregon with degrees in Advertising and Legal Studies. 

Iris Chen

Moloco

Iris Chen is General Counsel & Corporate Secretary of Moloco, Inc., a rapidly growing, global private company that provides machine learning-based performance marketing platform and services. She oversees all legal affairs for the company and manages a global team of attorneys and legal professionals that provide counsel on matters involving regulatory compliance, commercial, AI, privacy and data protection, M&A, corporate governance, antitrust competition, IP and employment law. Prior to joining Moloco, Ms. Chen spent four years at Airbnb Inc. as a Vice President, Deputy General Counsel, where she led a team of 50+ attorneys and legal professionals that support Airbnb’s product, commercial and marketing functions across the company’s Product, Engineering, Marketing, Communications, Creative Production, Supply Growth, Trust & Safety, Community Support and Airbnb.org teams, as well as managing the company’s trademark and copyright matters. Prior to joining Airbnb, Ms. Chen spent over 14 years with Google as a Vice President in the Legal Department where she led a team of 145+ legal team members responsible for supporting global product development and all commercial transactions in North America and EMEA for Google’s advertising, commerce, payments, search, research, health, geo and supporting infrastructure services. Ms. Chen is experienced in leading and developing legal teams and advising executives across product, engineering, sales, business development and other functions. Before joining Google, Ms. Chen was a corporate associate at Simpson Thacher & Bartlett (2001-2004) and then Ropes & Gray (2004-2006) as an associate in the firm’s investment management practice.  

Ms. Chen is a graduate of Yale College and Columbia Law School. 

Outside of work, Ms. Chen serves on the non-profit boards of the Children’s Discovery Museum of San Jose and the Silicon Valley Urban Debate League. She is an advisory committee member of PracticePro and also serves on Columbia Law School’s Alumni of Color Committee. She lives in the Bay area with her husband, three daughters and three cats, and is an avid runner and baker. 

Tom B. Davidson

WilmerHale

Tom Davidson is a Senior Associate in the San Francisco office of WilmerHale LLP. Mr. Davidson counsels clients on a wide range of investigations and enforcement matters including complex securities, sanctions, corporate fraud, FCPA, corporate governance and compliance issues. Mr. Davidson’s practice focuses on banking, cryptocurrency, finance, and technology industries. Mr. Davidson has represented dozens of large multinational corporations and individuals in a range of DOJ, Federal Reserve System, OFAC and SEC enforcement matters. He routinely engages with regulators and represents clients testifying before various government agencies. Mr. Davidson maintains an active pro bono practice primarily focused on record clearance, asylum petitions, and access to housing.

Mr. Davidson received his B.A. from American University and graduated from Stanford Law School.

Andrew Diachenko

Latham & Watkins

Andrew Diachenko is an associate in the San Francisco office of Latham & Watkins LLP. Mr. Diachenko is a member of the firm’s White Collar Defense & Investigations Practice and Litigation & Trial Department. He advises clients on government and internal investigations and government-facing litigation. Mr. Diachenko has particular experience representing global technology companies. 

Mr. Diachenko has advised Fortune 500 corporations in response to whistleblower complaints involving potential violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA). Recently, his representation of United Microelectronics Corporation (UMC), in response to a government indictment seeking as much as US$8 billion for trade secret theft and economic espionage, culminated in a plea agreement for a lesser count and a US$60 million fine. Mr. Diachenko has also advised global technology companies faced with other sensitive matters, including responding to Civil Investigative Demands (CIDs) and investigating executive misconduct. Mr. Diachenko maintains an active pro bono practice, primarily representing clients in asylum matters. 

Mr. Diachenko received his B.A. from the University of California, Los Angeles, and he graduated from the University of California, Los Angeles School of Law.

Jennifer Martinez

Hanson Bridgett

Jennifer Martinez is a partner in the Labor and Employment group of Hanson Bridgett LLP and is also the firm’s Chief Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion Officer. She works with management, practice group leadership, and committees to provide strategic, programmatic, and operational leadership for initiatives that advance diversity, equity, and inclusion as core values of the firm. This includes creating and implementing DEI trainings and programming; developing and executing diversity hiring, retention, performance review, and advancement goals and policies; re-examining internal policies and practices with an eye towards rooting out unconscious bias and inequity; managing individual and firm-wide marketing efforts that highlight the firm’s DEI work; empowering attorneys to forge new and stronger relationships with public interest organizations for increased pro bono services related to racial justice and equity; partnering with law schools on pipeline initiatives; and coordinating internal and external efforts to promote DEI, and justice in the legal community and in local communities.

Ms. Martinez received her B.A. from the University of California, Los Angeles, and she graduated from Stanford Law School.

Max Mazzelli

Latham & Watkins

Max Mazzelli is a member of Latham & Watkins LLP’s Litigation & Trial Department and focuses on data privacy, complex commercial litigation, consumer protection, and cybersecurity. Mr. Mazzelli represents public and private technology companies in complex commercial and class action litigation in both state and federal courts involving data privacy, consumer protection, and commercial contract disputes. He represents companies in regulatory investigations and inquiries by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), and other US and global government regulators, agencies, and bodies. Mr. Mazzelli counsels technology clients on privacy and internet issues, in particular compliance with US state privacy laws (e.g., CCPA), FTC requirements, GDPR, TCPA, COPPA, BIPA, ECPA and wiretap issues, and CLOUD Act; behavioral advertising and social media; data collection; security incidents; and forensic investigations triggered by government requests for information. Additionally, he assists technology clients with privacy policy drafting and provides transactional support on privacy-related issues. 

Mr. Mazzelli donates a substantial amount of time to pro bono work, including representing a single mother in a habitability dispute against her landlord, representing an individual unlawfully transferred by local law enforcement to federal immigration authorities, and assisting individuals seeking expungement of their prior criminal records to restore their employment prospects and to receive needed social services. 

Mr. Mazzelli received his B.A. from the University of California, Berkeley, and he graduated from the University of California, Hastings College of Law.

Joshua Mates

Cooley LLP

Joshua Mates is a partner in the San Francisco office of Cooley LLP and has practiced employment law in Cooley’s labor & employment practice group for more than 20 years. His practice includes a broad mix of litigation and employment counseling, as he provides strategic advice regarding the full spectrum of human resources matters, from the beginning of the employment relationship to the end – drafting and negotiating contracts, implementing policies and practices, ensuring protection of trade secrets, ensuring compliance with complex statutory and regulatory matters, advising companies regarding worker classification matters, pay equity analyses, diversity initiatives and employee relations matters, advising executives and boards of directors through complex internal investigations, and investigating, negotiating and litigating pre-suit and filed actions. Mr. Mates also regularly assists clients with the employment-related aspects of M&A transactions, financings and initial public offerings.

Mr. Mates received his B.A. from the University of California, Los Angeles, and graduated from Stanford Law School.

Alvaro Montenegro

Alston & Bird

Alvaro Montenegro is an associate with the Litigation & Trial Practice Group at the San Francisco office of Alston & Bird LLP. He represents clients in high-stakes commercial litigation in federal and state courts. Mr. Montenegro focuses his practice on antitrust litigation, handling a variety of complex and class action matters involving price-fixing conspiracies, monopolization allegations, merger challenges, and other claims under the antitrust laws. Mr. Montenegro also defends companies against class actions arising out of data breaches. Before joining the firm, Mr. Montenegro was an associate with an international law firm, where he handled matters involving antitrust, unfair competition, trade secrets, securities, and fraud and whistleblower actions in state and federal courts. In 2020, the American Bar Association Antitrust Section awarded Mr. Montenegro with the Janet D. Steiger Fellowship, through which he interned at the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Office. Mr. Montenegro was also an extern with the Antitrust Bureau of the New York State Attorney General’s Office, where he collaborated on antitrust enforcement actions and investigations in a range of industries.

Mr. Montenegro received his LL.B. from the Universidad de San Martín de Porres and received his ACLB and LL.M. from New York University.

Himani Nadgauda

WilmerHale

Himani Nadgauda is a corporate lawyer in the Palo Alto office of WilmerHale. In her practice, Ms. Nadgauda represents public and private companies in a wide range of transactional matters, including formation, governance, venture capital financings, and mergers and acquisitions. Ms. Nadgauda was a summer associate at WilmerHale in 2022, and prior to joining the firm, she was also a summer associate at Alto Litigation. In addition to being a PracticePro Scholar, Ms. Nadgauda worked at PracticePro during law school, where she managed the Diversity Scholar Program and played a key role in launching Law School Mastery. Prior to law school, Ms. Nadgauda was also a litigation assistant at the ACLU of Northern California, where she worked in the criminal justice and voting rights space.

Ms. Nadgauda received her B.S. from the University of California, Berkeley, her M.S. in Chemical Engineering from the University of Illinois at Chicago, and her J.D. from the University of Michigan Law School, where served as Senior Editor on the Michigan Law Review.

Rachel Nagashima

Wilson Sonsini

Rachel Nagashima is a partner in the Palo Alto office of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, LLP, where she practices corporate and securities law. Ms. Nagashima represents both public and private companies on general corporate and transactional matters, including public company disclosure matters, venture financings, and corporate governance.

Ms. Nagashima received her B.A. from the Richard Ivey School of Business, University of Western Ontario, and she graduated from Osgoode Hall Law School, York University.

Laura Kabler Oswell

Sullivan & Cromwell

Laura Kabler Oswell is a partner in Sullivan & Cromwell LLP’s Litigation Group and a co-head of the Firm’s FCPA and Anti-Corruption Group. She represents companies and individuals in a wide variety of matters, including transaction-related, securities class, derivative, commercial, contract, product liability, antitrust, and employment disputes. Ms. Oswell also represents companies and individuals in matters before the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Within the past six years, she has tried three cases to verdict, achieving wins for all clients. Ms. Oswell recently co-led the team at S&C that partnered with Stanford Law School to launch the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act Clearinghouse, a public database that aggregates and curates source documents and provides analytic tools related to enforcement of the FCPA since its enactment.

Ms. Oswell received her B.S. from the University of Southern California and graduated from Stanford Law School.

Priyank Patel

Wisk Aero

Priyank Patel is a product counsel at Wisk Aero, a wholly owned subsidiary of Boeing developing autonomous, electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft.

Before joining Wisk, Mr. Patel worked on legal matters for several top law firms and companies including, Amazon, Meta, Fenwick & West, and Morrison & Foerster. His practice has centered on counseling clients on risk and transactions involving intellectual property and technology, with expertise in licensing, joint development, manufacturing and supply chain logistics, reverse logistics, strategic sourcing, and mergers and acquisitions. Committed to helping others, Mr. Patel also enjoys using his skills to take on pro bono opportunities whenever possible.

Mr. Patel is a PracticePro alumnus and earned his B.S. from UCLA in 2014 and J.D. from UCLA School of Law in 2019. During law school, he co-founded the First-Generation Law Students’ Association, and also assisted pro bono clients through UCLA Law’s trademark clinic.

Bahram Seyedin-Noor

Alto Litigation

Bahram Seyedin-Noor is the founder and managing partner of Alto Litigation. Clients hire Mr. Seyedin-Noor to understand difficult legal problems and solve them. The matters run the gamut from board disputes, to class action lawsuits, SEC investigations, trade secret matters, and commercial disputes. Each problem requires a different solution, but Mr. Seyedin-Noor’s approach is systematic: he understands clients’ problems early and deeply, forms a clear strategy, and executes on that strategy. Mr. Seyedin-Noor has been widely recognized by both his clients and his peers. Chambers & Partners ranks him among the top practitioners for securities litigation in California. Benchmark Litigation named Mr. Seyedin-Noor the San Francisco Litigator of the Year in 2021 and 2019, and also nominated him for California Securities Litigator of the Year in multiple years. In 2018, the National Law Journal named him as an Elite Boutique Trailblazer, and the Daily Journal has recognized his firm as one of the Top Boutique firms in California.

Mr. Seyedin-Noor received his B.A. from Pomona College and graduated from Harvard Law School.

Jeremy Taylor

Baker Botts

Jeremy Taylor is a partner and Department Chair of Intellectual Property in Palo Alto and San Francisco at Baker Botts LLP. 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, Mr. Taylor understands the goals of his clients and works to solve IP disputes accordingly. In addition to handling active lawsuits, as a trained engineer Mr. Taylor 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, Mr. Taylor helped open the San Francisco office of Baker Botts.

Mr. Taylor 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. Mr. Taylor’s 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.

Sebastian Kurian

Rowan Digital Infrastructure

Sebastian Kurian is the Chief Legal Officer of Rowan Digital Infrastructure, a Quinbrook Infrastructure Partners platform company. Rowan is a developer of sustainable hyperscale data centers to the world’s largest technology companies leading the way in the cloud and AI 
revolutions.

Prior to joining Rowan, Mr. Kurian spent nearly a decade between Google and Amazon. He was a Senior Counsel at Google providing legal support for data center site selection, acquisition, development, operations, sustainability, economic development, power procurement, energy infrastructure development and energy public policy and marketing. His work included clean energy power purchase and financing agreements across 4 continents for Google, one of the largest corporate buyers of renewable energy in the world. Prior to Google, Mr. Kurian was the first utilities lawyer for Amazon Web Services, where he was responsible for supporting Amazon’s data center energy infrastructure and supply needs across the globe, including its initial renewable energy power purchase agreements. Earlier in his career, he was the Assistant General Counsel of one of the oldest and largest building and civil construction firms in the US, and a commercial real estate, construction and transactional finance associate at AmLaw 200 law firms.

Mr. Kurian holds a JD from the University of Maryland with honors and BA from the University of Pennsylvania with honors. He has completed Yale’s Financing and Deploying Clean Energy Certificate Program and Berkeley Law’s General Counsel University Program. In 2021, the Minority Corporate Counsel Association (MCCA) recognized him as one of its “Rising Stars.” Mr. Kurian has held a TS/SCI level security clearance.

Mr. Kurian lives outside Seattle, WA with his wife, son and two dogs. Outside of work he enjoys outdoor activities, traveling, fitness, and rooting for his hometown Baltimore Ravens and 
Orioles.