Eric joined Joele Frank in 2001 and opened the firm’s San Francisco office in 2014. He provides strategic communications counsel to clients involved in special situations, including M&A transactions, shareholder activism, data breaches, complex litigation, management changes, regulatory investigations, and other crisis events. His areas of expertise include:

Mergers & Acquisitions

He advises clients on the communications challenges involved in both friendly and unsolicited M&A transactions. Notable assignments include: Symantec in its acquisition of Blue Coat Systems, Gilead in its acquisition of Kite Pharma, Altera in its sale to Intel, Verifone in its sale to Francisco Partners, SolarCity in its sale to Tesla, Symantec in its sale of Veritas to The Carlyle Group, Aruba Networks in its sale to HP, J.M. Smucker in its acquisition of Big Heart Pet Brands, Amgen in its acquisition of Onyx Pharmaceuticals, Thermo Fisher Scientific and Life Technologies in their merger, Merck in its merger with Schering-Plough, Microsoft in its unsolicited acquisition proposal for Yahoo!, Electronic Arts in its unsolicited acquisition proposal for Take-Two, PeopleSoft in its defense against Oracle’s hostile takeover, Public Storage in its unsolicited acquisition of Shurgard, and SIRIUS in its merger with XM. Spin-off experience includes Symantec (Veritas), JDS Uniphase (Lumentum), and Ralcorp (Post Foods).

Shareholder Activism & Short Attacks

Assignments include Deckers Brands (Marcato), Mellanox (Starboard), Citrix (Elliott), Shutterfly (Marathon), Depomed (Starboard), Informatica (Elliott), JDSU (Sandell), Electronic Arts (Relational), lululemon (Chip Wilson), Jamba Juice (Engaged), Ralcorp (Corvex), Clearwater Paper (SAC), Astex Pharmaceuticals (Sarissa), Comverge (Raging), Ceridian (Pershing Square), Cyberonics (Metropolitan), Houston Exploration (JANA), Nu Skin (short sellers), Signet (short sellers) and Questcor (short sellers).

Crisis Communications

He advises companies facing a variety of crisis situations, including data breaches, litigation, restructurings, fraud and accounting irregularities, government investigations, regulatory actions, internal/board investigations, product recalls, workforce reductions and facility closures, and sudden management changes.

Public Relations and Investor Relations

He develops and implements corporate communications and IR programs to help clients achieve their business objectives. He also provides communications support to private equity firms, including L Catterton and TowerThree Partners, at both the firm and portfolio company level. He has also advised boards and management teams on matters of governance and succession, including advising the co-founder and Chairman of NIKE with respect to his ownership and leadership of NIKE and his ultimate transition as Chairman.

Eric was named one of PR Week’s 40 Under 40 in 2014. He has served on the Board of the San Francisco Chapter of the National Investor Relations Institute (NIRI). Prior to joining Joele Frank, Eric worked for Vice President Al Gore during the 2000 presidential campaign. During that time, he worked on the Democratic National Convention and participated in the Florida election recount. He provided pro bono public relations counsel to the Hetrick-Martin Institute, home of the Harvey Milk High School, when HMI was preparing to launch its new, publicly-funded New York City high school. Eric received a BA from the University at Albany and an MSc from the London School of Economics.