Mark Haddad is an experienced lawyer with wide-ranging corporate and financial experience, including as a partner and practice chair at a major international law firm and as general counsel to a global investment management firm with offices in Stamford, Hong Kong and London. He serves as Managing Partner of Flatiron Law Group LLP.
Mark focuses on corporate, securities, banking and financial matters, including U.S. and international mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures and strategic alliances and corporate governance, asset management and private investment funds, clean energy and infrastructure, secured and unsecured bank lending and other transactional and financial regulatory matters.
In his international work, Mark has advised clients on matters involving parties from more than 22 countries in North America, Latin America, Asia and Europe in diverse projects and industries, including cross-border transactions, foreign direct investment and the development, financing and implementation of power, energy, transportation and other infrastructure projects involving billions of dollars of investment capital.
Mark represents clients on the formation and operation of private equity and hedge funds, including regulatory compliance and matters involving internal and government investigations and regulatory enforcement actions. Drawing on his experience as general counsel for a global investment management firm, Mark advises clients on a variety of manager and fund structures and has specialized expertise on the design and implementation of effective global compliance programs for funds investing and operating in multiple markets.
Mark also represents entrepreneurs, startups and venture-backed companies. His work for emerging growth companies includes formation, licensing and protection of intellectual property, employment and real estate matters, venture financing, joint ventures and M&A transactions. Known for his solid business judgment, energy and enduring sense of optimism, Mark has a passion for excellence in facilitating the business goals of clients.
Mark started his career as a CPA at PricewaterhouseCoopers, was trained as an associate at Sullivan & Cromwell and worked as a banker at Goldman Sachs. He was a partner and co-chair of the global project finance practice at Jones Day (an Amlaw 5 firm and 10th largest global firm) for eight years. Subsequently, Mark was Managing Director & General Counsel to an investment management firm with 175 employees with offices in Stamford, Hong Kong and London, with smaller operations in Tokyo and Singapore.
In 2010, Mark founded a firm to support clients seeking to reduce legal costs while maintaining the quality of the advice they seek. He recognized that companies increasingly are under pressure to contain costs, especially following the economic downturn in 2008. Mark also recognized the immense pressure on partners and associates at law firms serving those clients to bill more and more time and increase rates year-to-year, creating incentives misaligned to the best interests of clients.
Mark sought to create a different kind of firm. A firm dedicated to helping clients by offering responsive and cost-effective services through a boutique platform with low overhead, a progressive labor model and next generation technology and legal project management techniques resulting in measurable efficiency gains, better collaboration and outstanding work product. A firm where the incentives to leverage knowledge, not labor, and be as efficient as possible, were aligned to the best interests of clients.