Clay Deanhardt relies on 17 years of experience to help clients achieve their business goals efficiently and effectively.

Practice Philosophy

Helping a business -- large or small -- requires more than just accomplishing individual tasks. It requires personal service and a holistic approach that includes a thorough understanding of the business and its goals.  Mr. Deanhardt integrates himself as much as possible with clients to help them address their legal needs in the context of their business goals.  Mr. Deanhardt finds solutions so you can focus on your business.

Background

After graduating cum laude from Harvard Law School in 1992, Mr. Deanhardt began his career with the San Francisco-based law firm of Dinkelspiel, Donovan and Reder, before moving to the international law firm of Brown & Wood, LLP (now Sidley Austin, LLP).  In 1995 he began working with high tech companies while at Graham & James (now Squire Sanders & Dempsey, LLP) before moving in-house at Covad Communications Company.

In 2001, Mr. Deanhardt became President, General Counsel and a member of the Board of Directors for Epidemic Networks, a start-up networking and communications software company in Santa Barbara.  He subsequently ran his own legal and business consulting firm, Deanhardt Consulting, and then worked for AT&T until Covad recruited him to return as Assistant General Counsel.

The Law Office of Clay Deanhardt opened in May 2006 to meet the need Mr. Deanhardt saw, as a purchaser of legal services, for high-quality, low-cost services focused on achieving business results.

Selected Accomplishments:

• Created service and advertising agreements for new Internet services and emerging Internet technologies.
• Drafted and negotiated inbound and outbound domestic and international license agreements (including support and maintenance agreements) for hardware and software.
• Drafted and negotiated domestic and international reseller, distributor, MSP and CSP agreements.
• Coordinated enterprise software license negotiations that eliminated a potential $30+ million liability in favor of a new license that reduced the client's expenses.
• Drafted and negotiated inbound and outbound commercial agreements, including sales contracts, software development agreements and all collateral agreements.

• As in-house counsel, managed legal support for labor and employment issues, including legal issues surrounding a nation-wide reduction in force and including recruitment and training of new counsel to directly support human resources.

• Plaintiff and defense representation in numerous California state court civil actions and private arbitrations.
• Led and coordinated successful multiparty defense of the appeal to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals of the Northern District Court’s dismissal of civil RICO and fraud claims in Currier et al v Chow et al., No. 06-15390.
• Counsel for Defendant / Intervenor / Appellant Cbeyond Communications, LLC in Pacific Bell Telephone Company dba AT&T California v. California Public Utilities Commission et al., Case Nos. 08-15568 and 08-15716 now pending before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.
• Local counsel in patent litigations pending before the USDC for the Northern District of California.
• Reduced litigation exposure by managing soured customer relationships as a business issue, resolving those issues and retaining the customers.
• Led industry appeal in Covad Communs. Co. v. FCC, 450 F.3d 528 (DC Cir. 2006) (affirming FCC's unbundling decision for network elements offered to competitive local carriers).

• As in-house counsel, consulted regarding SOX compliance and corporate communications.

• Provided harassment training to management-level employees and senior management to meet California's harassment training laws.
• Consulted for the Minnesota Department of Commerce and the Arizona Residential Utility Consumer Office regarding telecommunications business and regulatory issues, ultimately providing expert testimony on behalf of both.

• Significant regulatory victories before the California Public Utilities Commission.

• Managed a start-up software company, transforming it from a consumer Internet company with no revenue model into a business software company with a Fortune 500 pilot customer and three-year plan to profitability.
  • Wrote the business, marketing and financial plans.
  • Prepared and delivered business plan presentation for potential A-round investors.
  • Recruited executive team including VP of Engineering and VP of Marketing.
  • Managed software development team located in Santa Barbara and New Zealand.
• In 1999, led the cross-functional team that designed and implemented a new method for deploying DSL broadband services that opened the residential market to CLECs.

• Negotiated and drafted complex interconnection agreements with incumbent telephone companies across the United States.