Emily O. Roberts 

Emily O. Roberts is a partner in Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP’s corporate practice that advises companies on key transactions. She also serves as the Northern California lead for the DPWomen affinity group, which focuses on career development and mentoring. She joined the firm in 2011, directly after graduating from Stanford Law School.

She was a member of the team that won a 2020 Daily Journal CLAY award for its work on Uber Technologies, Inc.’s mammoth $8.1 billion IPO.

This year, Roberts provided corporate advice amid the dramatic events surrounding the March failure of Silicon Valley Bank, working with the bridge bank that emerged from the wreckage as it was acquired by First Citizens Bank.

She said it was a firm-wide effort under extreme time pressure. “Our leading M&A teams from Washington and New York led the way, and when some questions of California law arose, I was able to play a part.” Also, there was the impact on the many Silicon Valley businesses affected by the situation. “There was a good deal of uncertainty, and we constantly fielded calls from others concerned.”

That dust settled amid an already busy year as capital markets opened wider than in 2022. “It seems there’s been a lot more activity in these markets this year,” she said.

In June, Roberts and colleagues advised electric carmaker Lucid Group, Inc. in connection with a $1.2 billion underwritten public offering of common stock and an additional $1.8 billion private placement of the stock to its majority stockholder, the Public Investment Fund.

Also, that month, there was a long-term $232 million strategic supply agreement. Lucid will provide Aston Martin Lagonda Global Holding PLC, a maker of luxury autos, with powertrain and battery system technologies.

“It’s exciting to be part of the EV revolution,” she said, noting that she and the firm helped Lucid go public in 2020.

In July, Davis Polk acted as special counsel to Nextracker Inc., a maker of solar tracking panels and integrated software that allow systems to move with the sun for power generation.

The company and certain stockholders offered 18.1 million shares of Class A common stock for about $662.5 million in total gross proceeds. “I’ve been advising them,” Roberts said.

“These companies do truly world-changing stuff,” she added. “It’s a lot of fun to be a part of that, to help them get access to capital.”

—John Roemer