Chris Cowley

Chris advises private equity sponsors, management teams, founders, corporates, family offices, and privately wealthy individuals. His practice spans complex, cross-border and UK private equity investments, acquisitions and disposals, minority investments, joint ventures, family transitions and corporate restructurings – with particular depth in the financial and professional services, clean energy, and life sciences sectors. He is especially interested in the convergence of these sectors with emerging technology, and the legal and governance questions this creates.

Clients praise him for his ability to assess complex situations rapidly and private pragmatic and clear judgment under pressure. He draws on wide experience across deal forms and corporate law to identify novel solutions, minimise uncertain risk effectively, and manage competing interests from first principles. He builds this around his client's commercial and personal objectives.

Clients use Chris as a trusted sounding board for their most difficult problems, particularly in designing investment and governance structures to anticipate and minimise the friction relationships may face over time. He is often consulted on transactions before the term sheet phase to ensure clients are best placed from the outset.

He has particular expertise advising on US investment into the UK market, in particular how to bridge the different cultural and legal approaches to deals.

Chris views high quality advice as combining human, commercial and legal aspects to provide relationship-based judgment and foresight.