Kristin E. VanderPas

VanderPas may be a young attorney, but she has already worked on more than 70 initial public offerings in her career.

The Cooley LLP partner said she typically works on eight to 10 IPO transactions at once. Her legal practice is now exclusively focused on capital markets, though she works with companies as well as financial institutions underwriting the deals.

"IPOs can be tough if you're not doing them on a daily basis," VanderPas said. "They can be time consuming and demanding so it can hard for people to juggle. That's part of the reason why I specialized."

Earlier this year, VanderPas co-led the Cooley team of lawyers advising the underwriting syndicate in the deal where Gossamer Bio Inc. transitioned into a publicly traded company.

The stakes were high. San Diego-based Gossamer Bio, a biotechnology startup which focuses on immunity, inflammation and cancer therapy, started its IPO process at the end of last year. The U.S. government shut down on Dec. 22, 2018, while the company was getting closer to trading on public markets.

The government closure meant the Securities and Exchange Commission would not be open to review aspects of the IPO process. Attorneys working on the Gossamer Bio IPO had to grapple with all the legal issues that arose as a result. The SEC later issued guidance on how companies could go public during the government closure.

Gossamer Bio was expected to be the first healthcare company to go public using an automatically effective registration statement but the shutdown ended on Jan. 25 and the SEC was reopened. About two weeks later, shares of Gossamer Bio stock started trading on Nasdaq.

"We had to do a lot of thinking about how we could do it and how to get creative for this offering, despite the government shutdown," VanderPas said. "We were able to gain a unique perspective and it was an interesting challenge, but hopefully we don't have to use that knowledge again."

The Gossamer Bio deal was the third largest life sciences IPO in nearly 20 years, according to Cooley.

This summer, VanderPas co-led the team representing the underwriters on the $408.5 million IPO of Livongo Health, a company that uses technology to help its customers manage chronic conditions.

She also co-led the team advising the underwriting syndicate in the $209.3 million IPO of Health Catalyst, which provides data and analytics technology services to healthcare organizations.

"A lot of the life science companies are working to cure cancer so that feels special to work on those and the tech companies are changing the way we live our lives," VanderPas said. "There's a big convergence in life sciences and tech, which used to not be the case."

VanderPas said she enjoys working on transactions because much of her practice requires interaction with other people.

"It's a very people-oriented practice. Doing offerings is very much an in-person thing, which I think is a little unusual. I like the personal interactions rather than working by myself," VanderPas said. "I'm a little bit of a deal junkie so I can get in and get out, so I can move onto the next one. Each offering is a new company so it's a new challenge but it is fun."

-- Alexandra Applegate