Silver Sponsor

Vinson & Elkins LLP

https://www.velaw.com/

 

Vinson & Elkins LLP (V&E) is a multinational law firm headquartered in Houston, Texas.  Founded in 1917 during a historicm Texas oil boom, the firm employs over 700 lawyers worldwide across fourteen offices in major international energy, financial, and political centers. V&E is globally regarded for its energy, infrastructure, and corporate practices, and has been ranked the top law firm in Texas for ten consecutive years and the top law firm for Energy, Oil & Gas for thirteen consecutive years.

Gold Sponsor

Levenfeld Pearlstein

https://www.lplegal.com/

Founded in 1999, Levenfeld Pearlstein (LP) is a national law firm dedicated to providing sophisticated legal counsel through a client-centered approach. From its inception, LP was built on the belief that strong relationships, trust, and a deep understanding of a client's business are what truly differentiate legal service providers. While many firms emphasize responsiveness, efficiency, and high-quality work, LP views those qualities as the baseline. The firm's goal is to go beyond expectations by delivering legal solutions that support both immediate needs and long-term business objectives. 

LP represents businesses, entrepreneurs, investors, financial institutions, family offices, and individuals across a broad range of legal disciplines. Its multidisciplinary platform includes Corporate, Employment & Executive Compensation, Financial Services & Restructuring, Community Association, Intellectual Property, Litigation, Real Estate, Tax Planning, and Trusts & Estates. The firm is particularly known for helping clients navigate complex transactions, litigation matters, and strategic business challenges while maintaining a highly personalized level of service. 

A key differentiator of LP is its ability to combine the sophistication and resources of a larger law firm with the accessibility, agility, and efficiency often associated with boutique practices. Clients benefit from hands-on partner involvement, streamlined staffing, and practical legal guidance tailored to their specific business needs. The firm's attorneys work collaboratively across practice groups to provide holistic solutions that address the legal, operational, and strategic considerations facing clients today. 

While LP possesses the resources and depth necessary to manage the most complex matters in the most efficient and cost-effective manner possible, it truly differentiates itself through its commitment to The LP WayTM, a structure for the whole firm to deliver a consistent, exceptional client experience. Every person at LP – attorney and non-attorney alike – provides exceptional client service because The LP Way offers both the framework and the reason for doing so. We have created processes that align everything and everyone at LP to one goal: providing an exceptional client experience. 

Beyond its legal practice, LP is deeply committed to corporate social responsibility. The firm actively supports charitable organizations, community initiatives, diversity and inclusion efforts, and environmental sustainability programs. These initiatives reflect LP's broader commitment to creating a positive impact for its clients, employees, business partners, and communities.

Why did LP decide to become an NBA-CLS sponsor?

Levenfeld Pearlstein is proud to support the NBA Commercial Law Section and the professionals who help drive innovation and excellence within the legal industry. Sponsoring the Headshot Lounge provided an opportunity to invest in meaningful networking, professional development, and personal branding for conference attendees. As a firm committed to building authentic relationships and delivering an exceptional client experience, LP values opportunities to connect with peers, strengthen industry relationships, and support the next generation of legal leaders.

Additional Information...

Kevin Slaughter, Partner in and Leader of Levenfeld Pearlstein’s Corporate Group, has built a practice and leadership style that extends well beyond traditional legal counsel. While he is a corporate lawyer by trade, Kevin operates at the intersection of business, leadership, negotiation, risk, opportunity, and change. His approach is rooted in helping clients navigate complex decisions in real time, whether they involve growth, investment, succession planning, acquisitions, or market disruption.

What sets Kevin apart is his authenticity. He is not interested in performative leadership or offering advice from the sidelines. Instead, he brings a practical, transparent approach to every client relationship, drawing on firsthand experience working alongside founders, executives, investors, and entrepreneurs as they face real-world challenges. Kevin understands that today's business leaders are navigating unprecedented change and he meets those challenges with honesty, adaptability, and a focus on what truly matters.

This mindset has shaped the culture of LP's Corporate Group. Under Kevin's leadership, the team emphasizes practical, business-focused advice over theoretical solutions. He encourages lawyers to combine technical excellence with sound judgment, strong communication, emotional intelligence, and an understanding of each client's broader goals. As a result, clients view Kevin and his team not simply as legal advisors, but as trusted partners who help them build, lead, adapt, and grow through every stage of their business journey.

Benefactor Sponsor

Legal Innovators

https://www.legal-innovators.com/

Legal Innovators provides law firms and legal departments a proven way to expand the talent pool, rationalize talent costs, and reduce hiring risk. We identify high-potential lawyers, prepare them with practical training, and support their success through coaching and feedback.

Their process strengthens performance, improves retention, delivers measurable ROI…and proves that great lawyers come from many paths.

Gold Sponsor

Davis Wright Tremaine LLP

https://www.dwt.com/

In many ways, we look a lot like most other AmLaw 100 firms. We have smart, well-trained lawyers. We care about our clients and want them to succeed. We can offer niche expertise or deep teams, depending on the nature of your legal needs. Indeed, we "represent clients from start-ups to Fortune 100 companies on the full range of…" (see pretty much every other AmLaw100 firm website). 

But you probably want to know what makes us different. The main thing is, we know that great clients have lots of options, and we want to be an easy and obvious choice for them. So we’re open to looking for ways to meet their needs, as opposed to finding reasons we can’t. We won’t take you for granted or forget who works for whom.  

What Our Clients Need, However They Need It 

We’re open to solving legal questions in ways that work for your particular business needs, or corporate culture, or organizational imperatives. We’re open to serving you in ways that meet your budget, or integrate best with your team, or just give you more peace of mind. 

We look for creative ways to add value beyond our legal work product. We’re on a straight retainer with one of our largest clients, with no billable hours, providing budget certainty and eliminating the huge administrative burden on our client of reviewing bills. We built our own staffing agency so we could offer the flexibility and cost savings of contract professionals but maintain control over quality, service standards, and client integration. We won national innovation awards three years running, based on developing new and better ways of serving clients. And then we quit competing for those awards, so we could just focus on our clients. 

Excellence First  

All that wouldn’t matter much if we weren’t also excellent. According to colleagues who have joined us from other firms, we collaborate better to serve clients and build successful practices. We’ve built a national First Amendment team that protects content generators and distributors from those who would stifle expression. A litigation team that is a top choice for leading tech companies, healthcare providers and those in the cross-hairs of an over-reaching government. Multidisciplinary, industry-focused teams doing some of the most interesting transactional, regulatory, and litigation work out there in technology, media, entertainment, communications, healthcare, financial services, food and beverage, restaurants, and energy. 

We combine the focus, flexibility and personal connections of a boutique, with the scope, scale and resources of an AmLaw 100 firm – but without the drawbacks of either. Finding that balance has put us in a good place. We have out-performed the vast majority of the AmLaw 100 over the past several years but we haven’t forgotten who we are: open, humble, user-friendly, committed to service. We’re pretty sure you’ll be happy you chose us.  

Why did they decide to become an NBA-CLS sponsor? (50 - 100-word count)

DWT is committed to supporting the vision and mission of NBA-CLS, and have been longstanding supporters of NBA. We are intentional about partnering with affinity bar organizations to provide opportunities, resources, and support for our black attorneys. We aim to create an industry where all talented individuals, including those from communities traditionally underrepresented in the legal profession, can have and can see paths to success. Our partnership with NBA-CLS does just that. Our attorneys have greatly benefited from their engagement and the connections they’ve made through the CLS Conference, and are excited to continue our support of NBA-CLS in the years to come.

Additional Information

Diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) are part of the fabric of Davis Wright Tremaine—central to who we are and what we do. Our vision is to foster a culture where all talented individuals—including those from communities traditionally underrepresented in the legal profession—can have, and can see, paths to success. 

The Four Pillars 

Our DEI vision is built on four pillars, embedded across the management of our firm: 

• Community: Fostering a culture that generates a sense of belonging, supports authenticity and intersectionality and embraces and appreciates our differences
• Growth: Building and recruiting a diverse pipeline of talent and ensuring our professionals have equitable access to opportunities, information, and leadership
• Education: Generating opportunities to learn about DEI in order to elevate our individual and collective consciousness. 
• Engagement: Collaborating with external stakeholders, including our clients, affinity bar organizations, other external diversity organizations, to further our shared values around DEI.

Our commitment to DEI begins at the very top, with the active participation in our DEI efforts by the firmwide Managing Partner, the Executive Committee, and our Chief Talent & Inclusion Officer.  Our Diversity Executive Council (DEC) leads the firm’s DEI strategy and direction and includes our managing partner, several Executive Committee members, and key lawyer and business professional leaders from across the firm.  

Bronze Sponsor

About Axinn

www.axinn.com/

 

Axinn combines the skills, experience and dedication of the world's largest firms with the focus, responsiveness, efficiency and attention to client needs of the best boutiques. The firm was established in the late 1990s by lawyers from premier Wall Street firms with a common vision: provide the highest level of service and strategic acumen in antitrust, intellectual property and high-stakes litigation. Axinn's lawyers have served as lead or co-lead counsel on nearly half a trillion dollars in transactions and, in the last 10 years alone, have handled more than 300 litigations.

 

• Global Competition Review named Axinn the "Firm of the Year – Americas" for acting as global lead counsel in its representation of Ball Corp. in its $6.8 billion acquisition of Rexam, creating the largest aluminum can beverage company in the world. It also acted as global lead counsel for Dell in its $67 billion acquisition of EMC, the largest technology deal in history. The firm was nominated by Global Competition Review for Litigator of the Year, Litigation of the Year (SawStop v Black & Decker), Litigation of the Year - Cartel Defense (Auto Parts MDL), Deal of the Year (Dell's acquisition of EMC) and Dealmaker of the Year.

 

• Axinn has numerous seasoned IP trial lawyers and is a go-to firm for IP matters of strategic importance. The IP group typically has several dozen pending patent and trade secret cases, and tries multiple cases annually. Axinn has served as lead trial counsel in some of the most significant recent patent cases for the world's leading pharmaceutical, medical device, diagnostics, biologics and consumer products companies, including Johnson & Johnson, Thermo Fisher Scientific, Teva Pharmaceuticals and Unilever. On numerous occasions, the firm has been asked to take over cases during or after discovery and serve as lead counsel at trial, including the defense of a multi-billion dollar jury trial.

 

• Axinn litigators try cases and win. They have tried cases before juries, judges and arbitrators alleging breach of contract, business torts, breach of fiduciary duty, unfair competition, antitrust violations, employment discriminations, fraud and theft of intellectual property. Axinn litigators also understand their clients, their businesses and products, their goals and governance issues, and what keeps their GCs up at night. Axinn has particular expertise in serving financial institutions with dozens of insurer hedge funds, mutual funds, and other financial industry clients. Axinn litigators are frequently involved in litigation on behalf of international clients and have successfully represented clients in forums from the Cayman Islands and Jersey to ICC arbitrations.

Silver Sponsor

About Littler

www.littler.com

 

At Littler, our unparalleled commitment to labor and employment law helps our clients navigate a complex business world with nuanced legal issues – building better solutions for their toughest challenges.

How do we do it? By harnessing our deep experience and expansive resources that are local everywhere. By recruiting a diverse team of the brightest minds and fostering a culture that celebrates original thinking. By disrupting the status quo with bold, groundbreaking innovation – all in service to our clients. Because at Littler, we’re fueled by ingenuity and inspired by you.

With a singular focus on labor and employment law, our team is better equipped to serve your business. Why? Because our experience is vast and our knowledge is deep. For more than 75 years, we’ve focused exclusively on labor and employment law. But we realize it’s not enough to know just the law – we have to know your business, too. By understanding your challenges and opportunities, we can tackle everything from simple questions to complex litigation needs with the same rigor and nuanced approach. And, we can respond to each of your questions – not just with an answer, but with your answer.

At Littler, unconventional thinking is our norm. We listen to our clients’ issues and respond with bold answers that not only address their needs but help shape the industry. So whether you’re a CLO facing compliance challenges in the financial services field or a higher education Human Resources leader with employee benefits questions; whether you’re a GC dealing with wage and hour issues in the retail space or a business leader of an energy company who needs help navigating international employment law – you’ve come to the right place.

Silver Sponsor

About Duane Morris

www.duanemorris.com

Duane Morris LLP, a law firm with more than 900 attorneys in offices across the United States and internationally, is asked by a broad array of clients to provide innovative solutions to today's legal and business challenges.

Evolving from a partnership of prominent lawyers in Philadelphia a century ago, Duane Morris' modern organization stretches from the U.S. to London and across Asia. Throughout this global expansion, Duane Morris has remained committed to preserving its collegial, collaborative culture that has attracted many talented attorneys. The firm's leadership, and outside observers like the Harvard Business School, believe this culture is truly unique among large law firms, and helps account for the firm continuing to prosper throughout changing economic and industry conditions.

Our Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Mission Statement

Duane Morris is committed to being a law firm that includes people of diverse backgrounds and fully utilizes their talents to provide legal services of the highest quality. The firm will employ effective methods of recruitment of a diverse array of talent, and we will support their success and advancement within the firm.

Duane Morris is committed to fostering understanding, communication and respect among all people in the firm, including people of different races, religions, ages, genders, ethnic and cultural backgrounds, national origins, sexual preferences or orientations, medical conditions or disabilities, and marital, veteran or family statuses. The firm believes it should capitalize on the strength emanating from these differences. Drawing on the talents of all of the firm's personnel helps to create an optimum workplace, one which can attract and retain diverse personnel and clients, allowing it to enter and serve varying markets and approach services to its clients more creatively. Duane Morris has the ability to meet these challenges and recognizes the beneficial impact a successful diversity program will have on firm morale, productivity, strategies and success.

The Executive Committee of Duane Morris has appointed a Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Committee to facilitate the implementation of this Mission Statement.

Silver Sponsor

About Parker Poe

www.parkerpoe.com

 

For more than a century, Parker Poe has represented many of the Southeast’s largest companies and local governments in transactions, regulatory issues, and complex litigation. Our attorneys have extensive experience representing clients in the education, energy, financial services, government, health care, life sciences, manufacturing, real estate, sports and entertainment, and technology industries. Parker Poe has more than 275 attorneys serving clients from eight offices in Charlotte and Raleigh, North Carolina; Charleston, Columbia, Greenville, and Spartanburg, South Carolina; Atlanta, Georgia; and Washington, D.C.

Lawyers in each of our offices are rated among the highest quality attorneys across their respective states, recognized for effective and efficient service. The Best Lawyers in America lists nearly 100 of our attorneys in its rankings, and we are also well-recognized by U.S. News & World Report, Chambers USA, and other ratings publications.

 

Additional Information

Silver Sponsor

About Wiley Rein LLP

www.wiley.law

Wiley is a preeminent law firm wired into Washington. As a trusted advisor to Fortune 500 corporations, trade associations, and individuals across all industries, we provide strategic guidance on complex legal and regulatory matters that define the national and global landscape.

With the current administration shaping policy directives, regulatory enforcement, and legislative agendas, our highly respected attorneys and public policy advisors offer unmatched insights into the evolving priorities of agencies, regulators, and lawmakers.

We are the firm of choice in DC for many of the most innovative, influential, and transformational companies, business groups, and nonprofit organizations. From artificial intelligence (AI), autonomous vehicles, and blockchain technologies to government contracts, international trade, and telecom, media & technology (TMT), we integrate deep industry knowledge with sophisticated understanding of Washington’s regulatory and legislative environment.

Our interdisciplinary approach allows us to anticipate challenges, craft policies, and deliver solutions that empower emerging innovators and established industry leaders to thrive in an era of rapid evolution and heightened scrutiny.

 

Why did you decide to become a NBA-CLS sponsor?

Wiley is honored to serve as a Gold Sponsor of the National Bar Association – Commercial Law Section, supporting its work to advance inclusivity in the legal profession and foster meaningful connections between in-house and outside counsel.

Additional Information

Wiley is home to a dynamic group of attorneys dedicated to our clients, our work, and our community. At Wiley, we aim to leverage our collaborative culture to celebrate the collective strength of all people – all under one umbrella.

Wiley is committed to inclusion and engagement, fostering a culture where all employees are encouraged to bring their unique perspectives to the table. The firm's dedication to pro bono work and community service underscores its commitment to making a positive impact beyond the legal profession.

Wiley also invests in the next generation of legal leaders through strategic pipeline initiatives. We offer scholarships for pre-law and 1/2L law students who have demonstrated financial need, academic achievement, leadership, and resilience. These programs provide critical exposure to the legal field and help build pathways to success.

Our affinity groups play a central role in promoting connection and growth within the firm. These member-founded groups—including AANHPI Lawyers, Black Lawyers, Latinx Lawyers, LGBTQ+ Lawyers, Parents-in-the-Law & Allies, Veterans, Military Families & Allies, and the Women’s Forum—meet regularly to foster mentorship, inclusion, and professional development.

Our efforts have earned national recognition. We once again received a perfect score on the Human Rights Campaign Foundation’s Corporate Equality Index and were named a Top Performer and Compass Award recipient by the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity—our fourth time receiving this honor. We also continue to be recognized among the Washington Business Journal’s top corporate philanthropists.

Partner Sponsor

About​ Hamilton, Miller & Birthisel

www.hamiltonmillerlaw.com