CHOATE HALL & STEWART LLP

Charlotte Kim is listed in Chambers USA.  Ms. Kim’s global corporate finance experience as lead attorney encompasses over 140 transactions totaling more than $20 billion in value.  Her legal expertise spans the lifecycle of a company.  Ms. Kim is a Director of the Board of the Asia-America Chamber of Commerce.  She is also a founding Director of the New England Women in Energy & the Environment, a nonprofit group.  In 2009, Ms. Kim was selected by the National Asian Pacific American Bar Association (NAPABA) as one of the “Best Lawyers Under 40,” a national distinction awarded to fewer than 20 lawyers from across the United States.  She is also a Fellow of the American Bar Foundation, an honor reserved for less than 0.5% of all attorneys in the United States.  Ms. Kim served as the President of the Asian American Lawyers Association of Massachusetts from 2008-2010 and is a member of the firm’s Diversity Committee. 

Practice Focus

Global Corporate Finance:  Ms. Kim represents financial institutions and investors in all aspects of cash-flow and asset-based financings.  Ms. Kim also advises public and private companies and investors on their capital structures and financing needs, from startup through operations, acquisitions and other investments, and restructurings.  Her transactional experience encompasses senior, subordinated and other junior lending; buyout and acquisition finance; private placements and debt securities offerings; venture debt; domestic and international corporate finance; project finance;  securitizations; lease financings; and restructuring transactions, both in and out of bankruptcy.  Ms. Kim also has significant experience with numerous cross-border transactions and investments involving the US, Europe, Latin America and Asia.

Clients:  financial institutions, public and private companies, institutional investors, venture capital investors and private equity investors.

Sector Expertise:  Ms. Kim has substantial sector expertise in the areas of energy, healthcare and technology.  In the healthcare sector, her experience includes financings of healthcare receivables, acquisitions, start-up hospitals and restructurings.  Ms. Kim’s energy-related experience ranges from utility-scale general corporate and project finance to venture capital cleantech investments.  She also has more than 15 years of experience with climate change policy issues, and is a member of NAPABA’s national Committee on Sustainability and Climate Change.  Ms. Kim clerked for Professor Abram Chayes of Harvard Law School, and together they co-authored a chapter on China and the United Nations climate change negotiations in the book Energizing China:  Reconciling Environmental Protection and Economic Growth, distributed by Harvard University Press.  As part of her clerkship, Ms. Kim conducted extensive interviews in China and participated in UN climate change negotiations (INC-XI, AGBM and COP) as a consultant to the UN climate change secretariat.  She also authored the main reference brief for the judges of the International Criminal Tribunal for Ex-Yugoslavia in The Hague on one of the most commonly asserted defenses against war crimes -- the defense of obedience to superior orders.

Representative Engagements

• Represented Fortune 50 placement agent in $500 million Rule 144A debt offering.
  
• Advised and represented more than 25 venture capital and private equity sponsored companies regarding their corporate finance and acquisition financing needs.
  
• Represented fiscal agent under $6 billion Brady bond facility for Latin American government in connection with first default and acceleration of Brady bonds in the world.
  
• Represented foreign private equity investor in middle market acquisition financing with senior secured, first lien, second lien and senior subordinated tranches of debt.
  
• Represented '34 Act reporting company in complex, $150 million securitization of future flow receivables.
  
• Advised public company and its domestic and foreign subsidiaries in $35 million senior secured, multicurrency and multiborrower syndicated credit facility.
  
• Represented lead arranger and agent in $2.5 billion syndicated, multicurrency, multiborrower revolving credit facility for group of related US and UK companies.
  
• Advised international steering committee of creditors in restructuring of approximately $600 million of debt of major industrial group in Latin America.
  
• Represented lead arranger and agent in $800 million syndicated revolving credit facility to major satellite company to finance tender offer for certain outstanding bonds.
  
• Represented lead arranger and agent in syndicated, $120 million acquisition financing of NHL hockey team.
  
• Represented lead arranger and lender in $250 million cross-border financing structured using pass-through trust, supported by political risk insurance from OPIC and MIGA.
  
• Advised official committee of unsecured, structurally subordinated bondholders in connection with multibillion dollar Chapter 11 restructuring of major US energy company.
  
• Represented the lender affiliate of a Fortune 50 multinational in numerous asset-based and cash-flow credit facilities with complex capital structures and intercreditor arrangements in the healthcare and energy sectors.
  
• Represented leading lenders and sponsors in construction, development, financing and operation of various US and international power, gas storage and pipeline projects.

Presentations & Publications

“The Road to Partnership: Asian Americans in Private Law Practice," panelist, Harvard Law School’s 16th Annual National Asian Pacific American Conference on Law and Public Policy, February 2010.

“The Changing Landscape for Credit Rating Agencies,” co-author, Law360, February 2010.

“A Conversation with General Counsels -- Best Practices on How to Attract and Retain Diverse Legal Talent”.  moderator, CLE presentation and panel discussion at the national convention of NAPABA, November 2009.

"Corporate Law," panelist, Harvard University’s Undergraduate Women in Business, October 2009. 

Professional & Community Involvement

Ms. Kim is admitted to practice in Massachusetts and New York and is a member of the American Bar Association. 

Ms. Kim is also a member of the New York City Bar Association, and served on the Council on International Affairs (2004-2007) and the International Law Committee (2000-2003).  Ms. Kim is actively involved in the Boston Bar Association, serving on the Steering Committees for the Diversity and Commercial Finance sections.