Joseph M. Yaffe

Yaffe’s practice is split between handling large mergers and acquisitions and handling executives, including advising on tax and securities issues arising from equity compensation arrangements and handling employee benefits issues.

Over the last two years, Yaffe served as the lead executive compensation attorney on transactions such as Intel Corporation’s $4.2 billion joint venture with TPG Capital L.P. to form an independent cybersecurity company called McAfee. He also oversaw SanDisk Corp.’s $19 billion acquisition by Western Digital Corp.

“On the transaction side, it would be hard to not get excited for the Yahoo deal with such a transformative deal and closing a chapter on a Silicon Valley business,” Yaffe said. “It was a big deal and took a long time to negotiate and close.”

Yaffe added that Skadden has done a lot of merger and acquisition work with McAfee.

“Intel sold its controlling interest in McAfee and then they acquired Mobileye,” he said. “Two great deals.”

On the individual representation side, Yaffe said he recently represented Vishal Sikka, CEO of Infosys Ltd., as well as the company’s departing CEO. He is also representing the newly appointed general manager of the Los Angeles Clippers.

“What I love about what I do is that it’s technically demanding because the rules and regulations that govern executive compensation are complicated and change constantly and frequently,” Yaffe said. “At the same time, there’s a human side. It can be emotion and discussions that people take very seriously. It goes to heart or retaining talent to succeed as well as the livelihood to set and accomplish their financial goals they set for life. There’s psychotherapy to it.”

— Matthew Sanderson