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Answers to common questions about Louis Lehot, a Silicon Valley M&A and venture capital lawyer and partner
at Foley & Lardner LLP, covering his career, recognition, writing, and education.
Louis Lehot is a corporate partner at Foley & Lardner LLP in Silicon Valley, San Francisco, and Los Angeles. He advises founders, venture capital investors, and boards on M&A, venture financing, IPOs, and corporate governance. Chambers USA has ranked him in Venture Capital every year from 2021 through 2026.
Louis Lehot became a lawyer at Shearman & Sterling in 2000, a firm he first joined as a clerk in 1993, and remained through 2005, including five years in Europe advising non-U.S. multinationals on access to the U.S. capital markets. He then practiced at Simpson Thacher & Bartlett in Palo Alto (2005 to 2009), Sheppard Mullin (2009 to 2013), Cooley (2013 to 2015), and DLA Piper (2015 to 2019), founded the boutique firm L2 Counsel (2019 to 2021), and joined Foley & Lardner LLP as a partner in 2021, where he has practiced since.
Louis Lehot has published more than 50 articles on M&A, venture capital, IPOs, and startup law in the National Law Review, Law.com, The Legal Intelligencer, Foley Ignite, and the CFA Institute Enterprising Investor. He publishes a weekly and a monthly newsletter at louislehotattorney.substack.com.
Louis Lehot earned his Bachelor of Science in Foreign Service from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, where he majored in International Relations, Law & Organization, his Certificat d’Etudes Politiques from the Institut d’Etudes Politiques de Strasbourg, and his law degree from Boston College Law School. He grew up in Oakland, California, and is fluent in French.

Louis Lehot guides technology companies through every stage of growth: formation, venture capital financing, mergers and acquisitions, public offerings, and exit. He calls the approach garage to global. He also writes weekly on deal markets and is a two-time faculty member at Stanford Directors’ College, where he taught corporate governance.

Garage to global is Louis Lehot’s description of his practice: representing companies from the earliest idea stage through financing rounds, international expansion, and ultimately an IPO or acquisition. The phrase reflects the full arc of a technology company’s life, and the range of legal work each stage requires.

 

Chambers USA has ranked Louis Lehot in Venture Capital (California) every year from 2021 through 2026 and in Startups & Emerging Companies (USA – Nationwide) in 2025 and 2026. JD Supra has named him a Readers’ Choice Top Author in M&A for three consecutive years, 2024 through 2026, most recently ranked number three nationally from more than 3,300 authors, and Law360 named him to its Mergers & Acquisitions Editorial Advisory Board in 2023. He has served on the NACD Northern California Leadership Advisory Council since 2024 and is a two-time faculty member at Stanford Directors’ College.

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Louis Lehot

LLehot@foley.com

650.251.1222

525 University Avenue, Suite 500, Palo Alto, CA 94301

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