Farhad Jalinous

Partner at White & Case

Speaker

“Farhad Jalinous continues to be a leading lawyer in the national security arena, advising on CFIUS reviews. Interviewees say: ‘He is an excellent attorney with in-depth knowledge of the CFIUS area. He is very practical and understands the needs of the client.’”Chambers Global, 2020

Overview

Farhad Jalinous is a partner in our Global International Trade and Global Mergers & Acquisitions Practices, and is the Global Head of the Firm's Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) Reviews & US National Security/CFIUS practice. Farhad routinely represents clients from all over the world, including top Fortune 500 companies, in connection with the regulatory aspects of investing in the United States. His experience includes negotiating some of the most complex and sensitive national security agreements approved by the US government.

In particular, with over 25 years of experience, Farhad represents clients in national security reviews before the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), as well as before several agencies of the US government, including the Department of Defense, the Department of Energy and other cognizant security agencies, with respect to mitigation of Foreign Ownership, Control or Influence (FOCI) under the applicable national industrial security regulations. He also represents clients in national security reviews before the Committee for the Assessment of Foreign Participation in the United States Telecommunications Services Sector, which is commonly referred to as Team Telecom.

Farhad routinely represents clients in all stages of the CFIUS process, including conducting due diligence to assess potential areas of national security concern, deal structuring and other strategic planning, negotiating purchase agreement terms to ensure client protection, developing strategies for engaging CFIUS and its member agencies, preparing CFIUS filings and managing follow-up inquiries, negotiating mitigation agreements, and guiding companies through mitigation implementation.

Farhad also routinely represents clients in FOCI adjudications and mitigation negotiations with US government cognizant security agencies. In that regard, he has advised and negotiated numerous majority and minority FOCI mitigation arrangements, including Proxy Agreements, Special Security Agreements, Security Control Agreements and FOCI Board Resolutions.

Farhad is widely regarded as one of the very top CFIUS and FOCI practitioners in the US legal market. For more than a decade, he has been consistently recognized as one of the top-tier CFIUS attorneys (Band 1) by Chambers Global and Chambers USA. He has also been recognized as a top-tier attorney by The Best Lawyers in America 2020. Chambers Global 2020 noted: "Farhad Jalinous continues to be a leading lawyer in the national security arena, advising on CFIUS reviews. Interviewees say: "He is an excellent attorney with in-depth knowledge of the CFIUS area. He is very practical and understands the needs of the client." Further, clients have also recognized Farhad as "clear-thinking and well-connected" in The Legal 500 US. Farhad is often quoted by the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, Thomson Reuters, American Law Daily, The Daily Deal and others.