For nearly twelve years, Michelle Branch has represented small to large companies in sophisticated business transactions.

After graduating from Stanford Law School, Michelle began her legal career in the intellectual property and structured finance groups of Dewey Ballantine LLP.  As the Silicon Valley technology market expanded, Michelle joined Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati.  There she worked for several years as a corporate securities associate advising a broad and diverse range of clients on venture financings, IPOs and M&A transactions.  She served as WSGR’s senior corporate associate to Google in its immediate pre-IPO years—including several early financings and acquisitions, executive and employee equity compensation structuring, and significant strategic deals with Yahoo! and AOL.  She also acted as interim general counsel (through WSGR) to the public company Media Arts Group, Inc.  Other clients included numerous emerging technology enterprises funded by first‑tier venture capital firms (like Yodlee), public companies, and pro bono non-profit clients such as the International Museum of Women.

Herself an entrepreneur at heart, Michelle started an independent practice in 2003.  Recent clients have included venture funds, angel- and venture-backed technology companies and more traditional retail, construction and service businesses.  Representative transactions have included financing rounds, asset purchases and sales, strategic partnership deals, intellectual property licensing transactions, structuring founder and employee equity and venture fund formations.  Running the gamut from telecommunications to retail to design companies, her selected clients have included Twilio, NewRetirement, Fraiche Yogurt, Caffé del Doge, Semantic Sugar and Propane Studio.

Michelle earned her J.D. from Stanford Law School, where she also served as the chair and managing editor of the Stanford Journal of Law, Business & Finance (1996-98) and the President of the Stanford Business Law Society (1997-98).  She also holds an A.B. (honors) in American Studies from Stanford and is ABD in U.S. History from the University of California at Berkeley.

As a member of leadership teams in both the Full Circle Fund and the Junior League of San Francisco, Michelle is committed to philanthropy and community service.  She also serves on the board of directors of City Slicker Farms, a 501(c)(3) which works at the forefront of the food justice movement.  France, Thailand and Japan are her favorite countries to visit.