The Palo Alto office of Simpson Thacher represented the independent board of VMware, a leading virtualization software company, in connection with its recent $957 million carve-out IPO. Virtualization software greatly enhances an enterprise's utilization of its IT resources by, among other things, permitting applications designed for specific operating systems to run on a wide range of servers, regardless of their operating system. In its role, Simpson Thacher has provided advice with respect to corporate governance, employee benefits, intellectual property, tax and securities matters. The initial public offering results in VMware, formerly a wholly owned subsidiary of EMC Corporation, becoming a public company with two classes of shares outstanding. Class A shares, which were sold in the offering, have one vote per share, while the Class B shares retained by EMC, have ten votes per share.
The Palo Alto team includes partners Bill Hinman, Jim Kreissman and Jeff Ostrow, Senior Counsel, Richard Grimm, and associates, Rebecca Boyden, Ivan Rothman, and Victoria Stewart.