David A. Bell
Corporate
Corporate Governance
An advisor who guides clients day‑to‑day and through critical junctures in their lifecycle, David finds learning about new business models, technologies and emerging industries a rewarding part of his practice.
An advisor who guides clients day‑to‑day and through critical junctures in their lifecycle, David finds learning about new business models, technologies and emerging industries a rewarding part of his practice.
David advises startups and other growing private and public companies on venture capital financings, mergers and acquisitions, initial public offerings and intellectual property licensing. He also counsels public companies on corporate, securities, governance and compliance matters.
David co-leads Fenwick’s corporate governance practice and authors the firm’s prominent corporate governance, proxy season results and gender diversity surveys, which cover a variety of corporate governance matters and trends for the high technology and life science companies included in the Fenwick–Bloomberg Law Silicon Valley 150 List, as well as the companies included in the S&P 100 Index.
His extensive work on surveys and other research, as well as his productive relationships with founders, engineers and executives at innovative technology companies inform the insightful and strategic counsel he provides to his clients.
David served as interim chief compliance officer of InVision Technologies during its Foreign Corrupt Practices Act investigation and its initial integration into General Electric, giving him valuable in-house experience in sensitive regulatory matters.
- Armorblox
- Chegg
- Cisco Systems
- Databricks
- Docusign
- Glu Mobile
- Imperva
- LeapYear Technologies
- MetricStream
- Opsera
- Rapt Touch
- Remitly
- SentinelOne
- Skyways Air Transportation
- Swimply
- Tekion
- Together Labs
- Workday
- Advising IPO companies and candidates on governance and defensive measures, as well as periodic governance and defensive measures reviews for public companies, including preparation of stockholder rights plans (“poison pills”) (2000 – present)
- Advising in connection with internal, special and government investigations (2004 – present)
- Conducting annual board and committee self-evaluations for Docusign, Chegg, Glu Mobile, Cloudera, Imperva and other public companies (2010 – present)
- Advising management teams and boards on governance aspects during consideration of potential going‑private transactions (2010 – present)
- Advising boards of directors and special committees in connection with succession planning and CEO and other executive transitions, including special engagements (2008 – present)
- New director education for various clients including Chegg, Databricks, Docusign, Workday (2012 – present)
- Representation of Cloudera in dealings with the Icahn Group (2019 – 2020)
- Representation of Cloudera in negotiation of the governance arrangements in connection with the merger‑of‑equals with Hortonworks (2018)
- Representation of Imperva in dealings with Elliott Management (2016 – 2018)
- Representation of Cloudera in strategic investment and related governance arrangements with Intel (2014) and revision of governance arrangements in connection with Cloudera’s IPO (2017)
- Representation of Glu Mobile in strategic investment and related governance arrangements with Tencent (2015)
- Representation of Meru Networks in dealings with Castle Union (2014 – 2015)
- Representation of Meru Networks in dealings with Potomac Capital (2013 – 2015)
- Representation of Glu Mobile in dealings with Greenway Capital (2010 – 2013)
- Tekion in its $250M Series D financing (2021)
- SentinelOne in its $1.4B initial public offering and $50M concurrent private placement (2021)
- Armorblox in its $30M Series B financing (2021)
- Chegg in its upsized $1.15B public offering of common stock (2021)
- Docusign in its $690M convertible senior notes offering and $500M credit facility (2021)
- Tekion in its $150M Series C financing (2020)
- Chegg in its $1B convertible senior notes offering (2020)
- Glu in its $160M public offering of common stock (2020)
- Percipient.ai in its Series B financing (2019)
- Happy Money in its $70M Series D Financing (2019)
- Cloudera in its voting and standstill agreement with Carl C. Icahn (2019)
- Chegg in its $700M convertible senior notes offering (2019)
- Armorblox in its $16.5M Series A financing (2019)
- Boom in its $100M Series B financing (2019)
- Chegg in its $345M convertible senior notes offering (2018)
- Percipient.ai in its $14.7M Series A financing (2018)
- Cloudera in its IPO and follow-on offering (2017)
- Chegg in its follow-on equity offering (2017)
- MetricStream in its equity and debt financings (2017)
- Boom Supersonic in its financings and strategic partnerships (2017)
- Nexenta in its equity financing (2017)
- Boom Technology in its equity and debt financings (2017)
- Airware in its strategic investment from Caterpillar Ventures (2017)
- Practice Fusion in its equity and debt financings (2016)
- Glu Mobile in its investments in private companies (2016)
- Imperva in its follow-on public offering (2015)
- Glu Mobile in its strategic investment by Tencent (2015)
- Chegg in its investment in a private company (2015)
- Upwork (fka Elance-oDesk) in its financing (2014)
- MetricStream in its strategic financing (2014)
- Kony in multiple financings (2014)
- Glu Mobile in its follow-on public offering (2014)
- Cloudera in its strategic partnership and investment from Intel (2014)
- Auction.com in its financing (2014)
- Chegg in its initial public offering (2013)
- Glu Mobile and Meru Networks in their public offerings (2013)
- Liquid Robotics in its financings (2013)
- Playhaven in its equity financing (2012)
- Liquid Robotics in its joint venture with Schlumberger (2012)
- Chegg in its equity and debt financings (2009 – 2012)
- Kony Solutions in its equity and debt financings (2010 – 2014)
- Glu Mobile in its public offering (2011)
- ArcSight in its initial public offering (2008)
- Goldman Sachs as dealer-manager in a modified “Dutch auction” issuer self-tender by Extreme Networks (2008)
- Virgin American in its equity and debt financing transactions and ownership restructuring (2007 – 2010)
- Glu Mobile in its initial public offering (2007)
- MetricStream in its equity and debt financings (2004 – 2013)
- InsideView in its acquisition by Demandbase (2021)
- Glu Mobile in its $2.4B acquisition by Electronic Arts (2021)
- Docusign in its acquisition of Liveoak Technologies (2020)
- Chegg in its acquisition of Mathway (2020)
- Cloudera in its acquisition of Arcadia Data (2019)
- Chegg in its acquisition of Thinkful (2019)
- Imperva in its $2.1B acquisition by Thoma Bravo (2018)
- Cloudera in its $5.2B merger of equals with Hortonworks (2018)
- Imperva in its acquisition of Prevoty (2018)
- Chegg in its acquisition of StudyBlue (2018)
- Chegg in its acquisition of WriteLab (2018)
- Practice Fusion in its acquisition by Allscripts (2018)
- Cloudera in its acquisition of Fast Forward Labs (2017)
- Imperva in its disposition of Skyfence product line and acquisition of Camouflage Software (2017)
- Liquid Robotics in its acquisition by Boeing (2016)
- Chegg in its acquisition of IES and another private company (2016)
- Airware in its equity financing and acquisition of Redbird (2016)
- Cloudera in its acquisitions of CrowdStar and another private company (2016)
- Cloudera in its acquisition of xplain.io (2015)
- Cloudera in its acquisition of DataPad (2014)
- Chegg in its acquisitions of Internships.com and Campus Special (2014)
- Glu Mobile in its acquisitions of Cie Games and PlayFirst (2014)
- Imperva in its acquisitions of SkyFence, Incapsula and Tomium (2014)
- oDesk in its merger with Elance (2014)
- Tropos Networks in its acquisition by ABB (2012)
- Chegg in its acquisitions of Cramster, CourseRank, Notehall, Flux Software and Zinch (2010 - 2011)
- Meru Networks in its acquisition of Identity Networks (2011)
- ArcSight in its acquisition by HP (2010)
- Glu Mobile in its concurrent acquisitions of Griptonite and Blammo Games (2011)
- Glu Mobile in a PIPE transaction (2010)
- Concur Technologies in its acquisition of H-G Holdings (aka Gelco) (2007)
- Glu Mobile in its acquisitions of Superscape and MIG (2008 and 2007)
- “SEC Adopts Rules Regarding Pay Versus Performance”, Fenwick, August 2022 (co-author)
- “SEC Announces Final Rules Regarding Proxy Voting Advice and Proposed Rules Regarding Shareholder Proposals”, Fenwick, July 2022 (co-author)
- “CEO Succession Planning and Execution”, 27th Annual Stanford Directors’ College, June 2022 (speaker)
- “SEC Approves New Rules That Expand Electronic Filing Requirements”, Fenwick, June 2022 (co-author)
- “Meeting Expectations for Board Diversity”, Fenwick, June 2022 (co-author)
- “Fenwick’s Dave Bell Discusses California Board Gender Diversity Law with CNN Business”, CNN Business, May 2022 (interview)
- “California Court Strikes Down Board Gender Diversity Statute”, Fenwick, May 2022 (co-author)
- “Fenwick’s Dave Bell Discusses California Board Diversity Law with The New York Times”, The New York Times, April 2022 (interview)
- “Preparing for ESG Disclosure in 2022”, Fenwick, April 2022 (speaker)
- “California Court Finds California Board Diversity Law Unconstitutional”, Fenwick, April 2022 (co-author)
- “SEC Proposes New Rules for Climate Risk Disclosure”, Fenwick, March 2022 (co-author)
- “SEC Proposes New Rules to Enhance Reporting of Cybersecurity Issues”, Fenwick, March 2022 (co-author)
- “ESG in Silicon Valley: A Look at the ESG Disclosure Practices of the SV 150”, Fenwick, March 2022 (co-author)
- “SEC Proposes Rules Requiring Disclosure of Short Positions and Activities by Certain Managers”, Fenwick, March 2022 (co-author)
- “Fenwick’s David Bell Discusses Corporate Governance Survey”, Boardroom Governance Podcast, February 2022 (interview)
- “SEC Proposes Rules for Shorter Deadlines and More Transparency in Share Ownership Reporting”, Fenwick, February 2022 (co-author)
- “2021 Corporate Governance Practices and Trends”, Fenwick, January 2022 (co-author)
- “Best Practices for Establishing ESG Disclosure Controls and Oversight”, Fenwick, January 2022 (co-author)
- “SEC Proxy Voting Guidance Update”, Fenwick, February 2020 (co-author)
- “Proxy Season Trends: Make Sure You’re Ready for 2020”, Fenwick, February 2020 (author)
- “ISS and Glass Lewis Issue Policy Updates for the 2020 Proxy Season”, Fenwick, November 2019 (co-author)
- “SEC Proposes Rules Targeting Proxy Advisory Firms”, Fenwick, November 2019 (co-author)
- “SEC’s New Guidance Targets Proxy Voting Responsibilities”, Fenwick, August 2019 (co-author)
- Fellow of the American College of Governance Counsel
- Commissioned officer in United States Army Reserve; served as signal officer, communications security officer and psychological operations officer
- Head of information systems for mid-size Silicon Valley company prior to law school