Michael Vella
MANAGING PARTNER/FOUNDING PARTNER
loSAN DIEGO     |     SILICON VALLEY
BAR ADMISSION: California
EDUCATION:

• JD, UC Berkeley
• Graduate Legal Studies, College of Europe
• BA, Rhetoric, UC Berkeley

E-MAIL: mvella@cbcounselor.com 
TELEPHONE: +1-858-338-3383

Michael Vella ("Mike") specializes in international arbitration, IP litigation, investigations and global compliance counseling. In three decades of legal practice, Mike has worked as a partner for two international law firms (Jones Day and Morrison & Foerster) and served as General Counsel to a NASDAQ-listed technology company. Mike has particularly deep experience in cross-border disputes and compliance investigations involving the US and China.  He has represented some of the world's leading multinational companies in their China litigation, compliance and investigation matters.  He has also represented some of China's premier global companies in their US and European litigation, international arbitrations and internal and government investigations regarding their US operations.

Career Highlights:

• Won patent bench trial for defendant Taiwanese semiconductor company on invalidity grounds.
• Won patent jury trial for defendant U.S. manufacturer on non-infringement and invalidity grounds.
• As General Counsel for Velodyne Lidar, Inc., took company public in SPAC transaction, and prepared, implemented and enforced public company compliance policies.
• Successfully negotiated and settled worldwide patent license for Velodyne Lidar following Section 337 ITC Investigation involving its Chinese competitors.
• Successfully resolved an international arbitration for Chinese medical diagnostics company that was at risk of being shut down.
• Successfully achieved a settlement and worldwide patent license for Japanese patent owner following a multi-jurisdictional dispute (U.S., Europe, Japan, Korea) regarding semiconductor process technology.
• Represented leading semiconductor manufacturer on all its intellectual property and antitrust litigations in China, including a successful appeal to Supreme People’s Court.
• Successfully represented global pharmaceutical company in response to China FDA investigation and criminal case. arising from whistleblower allegations, including conducting internal investigation, obtaining dismissal of government proceedings.
•  Represented the life sciences tool industry in a US Supreme Court amicus brief, resulting in successful exclusion of drug discovery tool patents from broad interpretation of the FDA research exception.
• Represented and exonerated African American appellant wrongfully convicted based on testimony of police officer who was later indicted for perjury.

​Areas of Expertise

• IP Litigation
• International Arbitration

• Compliance Counseling
• Investigations