Paul, Weiss Partners with Regeneron and Start Small, Think Big for Legal Contract Clinic

Paul, Weiss and Regeneron partnered with Start Small, Think Big (SSTB) to host the kickoff to a month-long pro bono contract clinic for New York City-based small business owners. A longtime pro bono partner of Paul, Weiss, SSTB is a nonprofit that works to advance equity and inclusion in entrepreneurship by connecting small businesses with resources like legal assistance.

The contract clinic is an outgrowth of a prior Paul, Weiss and SSTB initiative through which we developed a contract resource center that provides template agreements to small businesses. Building on that earlier effort, volunteer attorneys at the clinic will provide longer-term, tailored advice to seven small business owners, including drafting and revising contracts that are essential to their businesses’ operations. After conducting an initial consultation to learn more about each clients’ business goals and needs, participating attorneys will work in teams throughout the month of June to draft contracts including an NDA for a media manager, a services and consent agreement for a therapist, and a wholesale agreement for an artist who handcrafts lamps, allowing our clients’ businesses to thrive.

The kickoff meeting, attended by 38 volunteers, included a presentation by SSTB that gave an overview of the clinic’s goals and SSTB’s work more generally. It also included a substantive training presented by corporate counsel Hilary Christian and associate Michael McKenna.

The Paul, Weiss volunteer teams are supervised by litigation partner Andrew Finch and corporate partners Brian Finnegan, Megan Spelman, Sarah Stasny and Ted Ackerman, and include corporate counsel Hilary Christian and associates Scott McGee, Adrienne Parms, Izzy Chen, Jack Rogers, Jordan Freisleben, Katherine Bogomolova, Lanlie Zheng, Matthew Battaglia, Michael McKenna, Noah Light, Sahil Solankee, Tyler Isaman and Zain Haq; and executive compensation associates Makesi Buddy and Sofya Bakradze. The clinic was coordinated by pro bono attorney Jeremy Benjamin.