Winston & Strawn Names Seven New Office Managing Partners

CHICAGO – September 23, 2021 – Winston & Strawn LLP today announced the appointment of seven new leaders to key firm offices in Charlotte, Chicago, Houston, London, Los Angeles, New York, and Paris.

“Winston is committed to delivering exceptional service to our clients worldwide,” Tom Fitzgerald, Winston’s chairman, said. “This new and accomplished team of managing partners will anchor seven important markets that are key to our global strategy. We congratulate them on this assignment and thank our outgoing office managing partners for their outstanding leadership.”

Winston & Strawn’s Executive Committee periodically realigns management and leadership. The new office managing partners will focus on continuing the firm’s recent growth and driving implementation of Winston’s strategic plan.

Winston & Strawn’s Vice Chairman Michael Elkin commented, “We look forward to working with our new leaders in implementing various goals identified in our strategic plan at both the office and regional levels.”

The new office managing partners are among the firm’s most accomplished leaders:

Michael Blankenship (Houston) is co-chair of the Energy & Infrastructure Industry Group and co-chair of the ESG Advisory Team. He focuses his practice on corporate finance, M&A, private equity, special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) offerings, and securities law. He regularly counsels public companies on strategic transactions, capital markets offerings, and general corporate and securities law matters.

Mats Carlston (New York) serves as co-chair of the Finance Practice and has more than 25 years of experience representing leading banks, finance companies, and direct lenders in syndicated financings and restructurings, with an emphasis on leveraged buyouts and recapitalizations of private equity sponsored enterprises.

Jérôme Herbet (Paris) is chair of the Paris Corporate Practice and has advised French and foreign private and public corporations as well as private equity funds in connection with various domestic and cross-border transactions, including mergers and acquisitions and stock exchange transactions. He also regularly advises companies for the purposes of corporate finance transactions, including private placements and complex financing structures.

Angela Machala (Los Angeles) serves as West Coast chair of the White Collar, Regulatory Defense & Investigations Practice. She represents companies and executives in high-profile white-collar criminal cases and securities and regulatory enforcement matters. She has extensive experience advising clients in a broad range of industries in matters involving securities fraud, health care fraud, theft of trade secrets, environmental crimes, FCPA violations, and other alleged offenses. Angela also assists companies in conducting sensitive internal investigations. She is active in the Latino(a) Lawyer Alliance at Winston.

Cardelle Spangler (Chicago) concentrates her practice on employment litigation, highly sensitive investigations, and counseling matters. She has significant experience representing clients in the financial services, medical device, pharmaceutical, and other industries. She has represented clients in complex class action, collective action, multi-plaintiff, and single-plaintiff litigation. Cardelle is chair of the Respect in the Workplace Committee and a member of the firm’s Associate Evaluation and Diversity Committees. She also serves as a special master for a federal district court and is co-chair of the board of directors of the Academy of Urban Schools Leadership.

Nicholas Usher (London) concentrates his practice on advising corporates and private equity sponsors on UK and cross-border mergers and acquisitions (both private and public), SPACs, securities offerings, corporate governance, and financings. He is recognized as a leading practitioner for M&A and Private Equity in the UK and led the team that won Legal Week M&A Team of the Year in 2016.

Danielle Williams (Charlotte) handles significant, high-profile disputes for publicly traded and privately held companies involving material damages demands in federal and state courts across the country and in arbitrations in patent infringement, trade secret misappropriation, copyright infringement, breach of contract, antitrust, and environmental matters. Her patent infringement cases have been concentrated in the top patent litigation courts in the country and span a variety of technologies and industries including financial services, high-tech, semi-conductors, telecommunications, software, mobile applications, and consumer products.