Ropes & Gray LLP

Kate Withers is a trusted advisor to clients on their most complex corporate transactions and a partner in Ropes & Gray’s global private equity transactions group based in New York and Los Angeles. Kate advises private equity investors and their portfolio companies on structured corporate transactions in the software, digital infrastructure, consumer, technology, health care, life sciences and financial services sectors.

Kate’s broad transactional experience—spanning private equity, strategic M&A, special situations, growth and venture capital transactions—and commercial focus on structuring and executing sophisticated corporate transactions to achieve her client’s business objectives enable her to represent clients on their most complex and bespoke corporate transactions, including:

• Technology-focused carve-out transactions;
• Domestic and cross-border mergers & acquisitions;
• Technology-focused joint ventures;
• Leveraged buyouts;
• Pharma and music royalty sales and purchases;
• Distressed acquisitions and special situations;
• Restructurings and recapitalizations; and
• Preferred equity and convertible debt investments.

In recent years, Kate’s private equity clients have included GI Partners, TPG, KKR & Co., Lindsay Goldberg, HPS Investment Partners, Vista Equity Partners, Crosspoint Capital, and West Coast middle market funds. Kate also has extensive experience representing strategic acquirers across industries on M&A transactions, including Facebook (now Meta), Abcam, Tencent Holdings, The National Geographic Society, Peloton Interactive, Bonobos, BBVA, Humana, Cisco, American Airlines, Allergan, J&J and numerous biotechnology companies on M&A matters.

Kate’s passion for advising clients on technology acquisitions and her deep understanding of financial services, software, data and life sciences businesses have their roots in her prior work as a quantitative data analyst in the financial services and health care industries, including at Bank of America, the World Bank, and for an interdisciplinary team of physician and economics researchers at the Wharton School of Business. Prior to attending law school, Kate studied economics as a Fulbright Scholar at the London School of Economics and was a research assistant to George Akerlof (2001 Nobel Laureate in Economics) at the Brookings Institution.

Kate has been recognized as a 2022 Top Woman in Dealmaking by The Deal, by The Legal 500—the world’s largest legal referral guide—for her work in “Technology Transactions,” and by Super Lawyers as a Rising Star in M&A in the New York Metro Area.

For more information, please visit https://www.ropesgray.com/en/people/w/kate-withers