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Mehrin Masud-Elias
Associate
Duane Morris LLP
30 South 17th Street
Philadelphia, PA 19103-4196
USA

Phone: +1 215 979 1947
Fax: +1 215 689 4930
Email: mmasudelias@duanemorris.com

Mehrin Masud-Elias practices in the area of corporate law with a concentration on mergers and acquisitions, venture capital financings, strategic alliances, business law and finance and securities regulation and is a member of the firm's Recruitment and Retention Committee. Ms. Masud-Elias also counsels clients in corporate governance matters and licensing, supply, distribution and other technology-related commercial transactions. Prior to joining Duane Morris, she served as assistant deputy general counsel for Comcast Corporation.

Ms. Masud-Elias is a member of the Board of Governors of the Philadelphia Bar Association and the Executive Committee of the South Asian Bar Association of Philadelphia. She is the former President of the Board of Directors of the Cambridge Multicultural Arts Center, a nonprofit arts organization based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She is currently a member of the Board of Directors of the Center for Emerging Visual Artists, a Philadelphia-based nonprofit organization. She is a frequent speaker on panels addressing professional development issues.

Ms. Masud-Elias is a 2001 graduate of Columbia University School of Law, where she was a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar and articles editor of the Columbia Human Rights Law Review, and a magna cum laude graduate of Amherst College, where she was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. She also studied Theoretical Physics at the California Institute of Technology (CALTECH).

Areas of Practice

• Mergers and Acquisitions
• Venture Capital
• Licensing/Strategic Alliances
• Business Law and Finance
• Securities Regulation

Representative Matters

• Represented GrainCorp Limited, an Australian publicly held agribusiness, as part of the U.S. legal team, in its acquisition of United Malt United Malt Holdings, the world's fourth largest commercial malt producer, for $655 million.
• Represented a dermatological product development company in its $12 million tranched Series A preferred stock financing.
• Represented VGX Pharmaceuticals, Inc., as part of the legal team, in its "merger of equals" transaction, valued at approximately $40 million, with Inovio Biomedical Corporation, a publicly held company.
• Counsel to emerging businesses in structuring, negotiating and drafting venture capital and other private equity financing arrangements and related corporate governance, executive compensation, and securities law compliance issues.
• Counsel to technology and life science companies in the structure, negotiation and drafting of various types of licensing and other technology agreements, and joint venture arrangements.
• Counsel to buyers and sellers in domestic and cross-border acquisition and divestiture transactions, including assistance with structuring transactions from business, regulatory and tax perspectives.
• Represented a large U.S. pharmaceutical company in all transactional matters involving the development, manufacture, supply, commercialization and distribution of its pharmaceutical products.
• Represented a large Japanese pharmaceutical company in structuring and negotiating its proposed collaboration, development and license arrangement with a U.S. biopharmaceutical company.
• Represented an Australian biotechnology company, in its divestiture of its U.S. dietary supplement product lines to a U.S. nutritional supplement company.
• Represented large Boston-based financial services companies in numerous merger and acquisition transactions and complex corporate reorganizations.

Professional Activities

• Center for Emerging Visual Artists
  - Secretary and Board Member, June 2009-present
• Philadelphia Bar Association
  - Board of Governors, 2009-present
• Pennsylvania Biotechnology Association
  - Member, Communications Track Subcommittee of Biotech 2008
• South Asian Bar Association
  - Treasurer and Board Member, Philadelphia Chapter
  - Member, Planning Committee for the National South Asian Bar Association's 2009 Convention
  - Former Board Member, Boston Chapter
• TiE (The Indus Entrepreneurs) NJ-Philadelphia
• DreamIt Ventures
  - Counsel to startup company participant, 2009
• Amherst College Alumni Club
• Wharton Club of Philadelphia
• The Network of Indian Professionals
• Women Inventing Next

Admissions

• Pennsylvania

Education

• Columbia University School of Law, J.D., 2001
  - Articles Editor, Columbia Human Rights Law Review
  - Chair, Columbia Law Women's Association
• Amherst College, B.A., magna cum laude, 1997
  - Phi Beta Kappa

Experience

• Duane Morris LLP
  - Associate, 2008-present
• Comcast Corporation
  - Assistant Deputy General Counsel, 2007-2008
• Morgan Lewis & Bockius LLP
  - Business and Finance Associate, 2006-2007
• Goodwin Procter LLP
  - Business Law Associate, 2001-2006

Board Memberships

• Center for Emerging Visual Artists
  - Board Member, June 2009-present
• Philadelphia Bar Association
  - Board of Governors, 2009-present
  - Member, Business Law Committee
  - Member, Private Equity and Venture Capital Law Subcommittee
• South Asian Bar Association of Philadelphia
  - Board Member, 2008-present
• Cambridge Multicultural Arts Center
  - Board President, 2002-2006

Civic and Charitable Activities

• Paralegal Studies Program of Community College of Philadelphia
  - Mentor
• Chester Avenue Dog Park
  - Volunteer/Member, 2007-present

Honors and Awards

• Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar
• Walter Minton Fellow
• Phi Beta Kappa

Selected Publications

• Pandora/Proloinkarini, Nothing But Red, 2008.

Selected Speaking Engagements

• Panelist, "Challenges Facing South Asian Women in Law," Drexel University, April 2008
• Panelist, "Navigating Diversity in the Workplace," Harvard Law School, April 2006
• Panelist, "Charting a Legal Career," Boston College Law School, October 2005