Sameena Chatrapathy

Sameena Chatrapathy joined the Firm soon after her graduation and has been with the Firm’s Chennai office since the year of its inception in 2006.

Sameena has worked on several private equity transactions in her experience representing both domestic as well as foreign funds, advising them through multiple rounds of funding. She also represents companies and promoters assisting in their fund raise right from preparation for funding through to completion. In the course of her experience she has worked with varied businesses and her sector expertise include healthcare, pharmaceuticals, energy and information technology. Her portfolio of clients include funds such  as Agnus Capital, IndusAge, the Tenshi Group and  businesses such as Olympus backed Aster DM Healthcare, Carlyle backed Newgen  and Qualcomm backed Attune  Technologies.

Sameena is also a lead member of the Corporate and M&A Team focusing on assisting and advising domestic and foreign clients in acquisitions both in India and overseas. She has worked on some of the high value and big ticket transactions in different verticals on one side and on the other, advised start-ups and early stage businesses in their compliances, investments as well as strategic alliances.

Sameena is also the exclusive ‘Recommended Attorney’ for Private Equity practice in India by Global Law Experts.

Lately, with her experience in investigation of allegations of sexual harassment and her inclination towards protection of women’s rights, Sameena Chatrapathy has spearheaded the Firm’s initiative to bring establishments in India in compliance with the sexual harassment laws, being a key member on the internal complaints committees of over 20 domestic establishments.

Sameena Chatrapathy holds a Masters degree in International Commercial Law from United Kingdom and a graduate with an honours degree from the prestigious, School of Excellence in Law, Tamil Nadu Dr. Ambedkar Law University, Chennai. She has been a university top rank holder all through her five years of under-graduate legal education, graduating with distinction.

Private Equity Law Practice:

Raising capital being synonymous with a much needed and necessary growth strategy to various corporations, we have gained significant expertise in this field by successfully leveraging our experience and specialization in domestic and cross-border investments. We combine our rich experience and expertise with laws / regulations and research capabilities to devise innovative structures for funding and have developed a successful domestic and international venture capital (VC) and private equity (PE) industry practice. With the advent of a start up culture and increasing interest in entrepreneurship in the country and the success rate of start ups in the country given the country’s rising consumerism, alternate investment funds (AIF) is poised to become an indispensable and integral part of the nation’s economy. India has meticulously been trying to ease the process of investing in India and constantly tried to boost investments in the country, with introduction of new securities such as convertible notes helping start-ups garner more, better and easier investments.

Our core proficiency lies in assisting national and international funds and investors, identify investment targets, structure the funding, conducting due diligences on the investee companies, preparation and negotiation of the transactional documents and assisting the company and investor through pre and post transaction regulatory compliance. Our transactional team’s expertise also ranges from being able to assist promoters and start ups to raise capital to assisting major corporations with corporate compliance and to further diversify their businesses.

We have constantly explored and mastered several verticals in the M&A and private equity market which has helped us grasp the intricacies of regional laws, regulatory environments, economic and commercial realities which in turn has enhanced our service capability. Our rich cross border experience and technical expertise has helped us provide targeted and tailored investment strategies and avenues for both foreign investment in India and overseas investment by Indian entities.

Our work with both listed and unlisted companies, investors and promoters has helped us appreciate and understand the whole gamut of the investments market in India, enabling us to assist companies and funds by providing an all encompassing advice keeping in mind the interest of all the parties to a transaction.

• Efficient structuring of the investment mechanisms the prevailing laws, regulations and other market practices.
• Drafting, review and negotiation of term sheets.
• Comprehensive and  issue  based legal and  corporate due diligence on target companies in light of industry specifications across various sectors and  respective state legislations for the purpose of legal risk assessment and recommending effective  ways to mitigate the same.
• Legal and regulatory requirements and assistance in seeking requisite approvals and making representations before the regulatory authorities such as RBI, SEBI, etc.
• Drafting, review and negotiation of transaction documents including share subscription agreement, shareholders’ agreements, and share purchase agreements, intellectual property assignment agreements, employment agreements, charter documents and such other ancillary documents.
• With preparation of ancillary documents pertaining to transactions such as disclosure schedule, compliance with conditions precedent and assistance towards closing and post-closing activities.