Fenwick’s Michael Esquivel Recognized by Business Insider Among Top Digital Health Startup Players

Fenwick corporate partner Michael Esquivel has been named one of the nine behind-the-scenes players who can make or break a digital health startup by Business Insider.

Esquivel is a nationally recognized top lawyer for emerging and high-growth companies primarily in the digital health, consumer tech, social networking, software and cloud computing industries.

Business Insider described Esquivel’s role in representing young startups by helping them hire the first few outsiders and advising them through raising institutional funding from venture funds or strategic investors. The publication referenced Esquivel’s work in representing OODA Health from its formation to its acquisition by Cedar Health.

Esquivel noted that digital health companies have grown at an unprecedented speed during the pandemic and that younger companies can choose from a menu of options for what to do next, whether that means selling the company or entering public markets.

He noted, "The best way to ensure the maximum flexibility for an exit is to go out and develop a great product and execute the heck out of it. You grind through getting it out there and then surround yourself with great teammates.”

Esquivel co-chairs Fenwick’s digital health practice, leads the firm’s Life Sciences Legal Insights blog and also teaches venture capital law at Stanford Law School. He receives consistent recognition for the excellence of his work, having been honored among the United States’ leading lawyers for work with emerging companies by both Chambers USA and The Legal 500, and has been named among California’s top 100 lawyers by the Daily Journal for four consecutive years.

Read more on Business Insider (subscription required).​​