Vinson & Elkins LLP

Capital Markets and Mergers & Acquisitions

Partner

David Palmer Oelman co-heads V&E’s Mergers & Acquisitions and Capital Markets practice group and he is a member of the firm’s Management Committee.

David is one of the country’s preeminent IPO practitioners, having worked on more IPOs in the last three decades than all but a small handful of lawyers practicing in the U.S. across all industries. He has worked with issuers and underwriters across a broad spectrum of industries. David continues to counsel clients after completing their IPOs, and  is experienced in corporate governance matters, follow-on public offerings, private placements of equity and debt, mergers and acquisitions, dispositions, joint ventures, and private equity investments. As David sees it, his three decade career has included three main components:

Midstream and Infrastructure

In the 1990s and the first decade of the 2000s, he advised on the initial public offerings of numerous midstream businesses, including for the predecessors of Kinder Morgan Inc., Energy Transfer, Plains All American Pipeline and dozens of others. This work has continued as midstream and other businesses have grown, including LNG and LNG-to-power companies.

Shale Revolution

Starting with his representation of Continental Resources on its IPO in 2007, David has been fortunate to represent a number of the pioneers of the “Shale Revolution” and over the past decade has worked with numerous upstream, downstream, and OFS businesses launched in its wake.

Energy Evolution

As David enters the next phase of his career, he looks forward to building energy evolution as traditional and renewable energy are combined most efficiently, and responsibly meet the world’s energy needs.