Professor served as Interim Executive Director through the end of the spring semester. Professor Bernthal begins work as Executive Director effective June 1.

"I am thrilled to be taking on this new role at the Silicon Flatirons Center," said Professor Bernthal. “Silicon Flatirons helps shape technology and innovation to benefit people. This project is as important to the community today as it has ever been.”

Professor Bernthal is a widely known and respected figure in the fields of entrepreneurial law, early-stage finance, and innovation policy. He has been an associate professor of law at the University of Colorado Law School since 2007. Professor Bernthal is the founder and director of the , which has been instrumental in supporting and fostering entrepreneurship in the region and connecting CU campus with the surrounding high tech entrepreneurial community. Professor Bernthal was part of the small cadre that launched CU’s New Venture Challenge, which just finished its 16^th year.

As the new Executive Director, Professor Bernthal is responsible for leading the strategic direction and operations of the Silicon Flatirons Center, which works to propel the future of law, policy, and entrepreneurship in the digital age. Through the center’s initiatives, events, publications, and student programs, he will continue to build on the Center's work to catalyze critical conversations among diverse stakeholders and develop professionals ready to lead.

"It’s an honor to work with the extraordinary scholars and entrepreneurs in our community," reflected Professor Bernthal. “We aspire to elevate the debate around technology and policy at a time when wisdom and foresight are imperative. The stakes are high, and our team is ready to meet the challenges of today and tomorrow.”

"We are very excited to have Brad take on this new role," said , dean of the University of Colorado Law School. "His experience, deep ties to Colorado Law, and expertise make him an excellent choice to lead the Center as we continue to explore the important legal and societal implications of developing technologies."

�鶹ӰԺ the Silicon Flatirons Center:

The Silicon Flatirons Center for Law, Technology, and Entrepreneurship is a leading interdisciplinary research center based at the University of Colorado Law School. The Center's mission is to explore the intersection of technology, law, and entrepreneurship and to engage in meaningful dialogue and research with stakeholders from industry, government, and academia. The Center is committed to fostering entrepreneurship in the region and to helping develop and promote a culture of innovation.

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Widely recognized for its intellectual diversity and originality, the faculty at Colorado Law encompasses an array of prominent legal scholars who are widely cited, both in academia and throughout the national media landscape. We invite you to catch up on the latest faculty publications and media mentions with this weekly round up, provided by the extraordinary .

Notable Mentions:

Brad Bernthal, Kristelia Garcia, Dean Lolita Buckner Inniss, Blake Reid, & SFC Distinguished Advisor JP de Vries,  (Silicon Flatirons Conference, Feb. 5-6, 2023).

Violeta Chapin, Debbie Kelley, , The Gazette, Feb. 5, 2023.

[Casey Fiesler, SFC affiliate faculty], Clarissa-Jan Lim, , Buzzfeed News, Feb. 8, 2023.

[Markus Funk, Colorado Law adjunct], , Washington Post, Jan. 10, 2023

Markus Funk, Bill Hutchinson, , ABC News, Jan. 18, 2023.

Markus Funk, , Dan Abrams Live (NewsNation), January 11, 2023 (appearance begins around 3:19).

Pratheepan Gulasekaram, Blake Reid, & Kyle Velte, Three New Faculty to Join Colorado Law, Feb. 10 2023.

Benjamin Levin, , Slate, Feb. 7, 2023.

Mark Loewenstein, , SSRN.com, Feb. 6, 2023 (SSRN login required).

Doug Spencer, , Mini Law School, Feb. 8, 2023.

Doug Spencer, Kate Riga, , Talking Points Memo, Feb. 9, 2023.

Ahmed White,  (Feb. 7, 2023). 

Ahmed White,  (upcoming, March 1, 2023).

Silicon Flatirons conference Cristiano Lima, , Washington Post, Feb. 5, 2023.

Silicon Flatirons conference, , TR Daily, Feb. 6, 2023 (Lexis login required).

Silicon Flatirons conference, Andrea Grajeda, , Daily Camera, Feb. 5, 2023.

[Colorado Law], , TaxProf Blog, Feb. 9, 2023.

[Colorado Law], , TaxProf Blog, Feb. 9, 2023.

[Colorado Law], , TaxProf Blog, Feb. 9, 2023.

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The skills needed to be a successful lawyer in 2019 and beyond are changing.

Law professors and practitioners agree: law practices today—as well as in the future—require broad and interdisciplinary skills that combine legal knowledge with an understanding of technology and data, problem-solving, collaboration, and personal effectiveness. In addition to the practice of law, clients expect new lawyers to also be competent in understanding the business of a client. Many schools, including Colorado Law, have responded to the shifting market demand for business and technology-savvy attorneys with specialized courses and clinics, partnerships with the business community, and opportunities for hands-on training.

When students leave Colorado Law, they not only have a legal skill set, they also are familiar with what makes and breaks a company, said Associate Professor Brad Bernthal ('01), who is at the forefront of Colorado Law’s entrepreneurial efforts. This is important in setting our graduates up for success, no matter their chosen area of practice, he said.

The "Colorado Law Way" of training attorneys combines a rigorous education, one that goes deep in the legal discipline, along with cultivating an entrepreneurial mindset, Bernthal said.

The foundation of the school’s success is rooted in high-caliber business law classroom work as well as clinical opportunities. Colorado Law further differentiates itself with an outward-facing emphasis. Students engage with the business community where they regularly interact with entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, and professional service providers. Further, Colorado Law’s affiliation with the University of Colorado, which Reuters named the 29th most innovative university in the world, puts the school in the right place at the right time for entrepreneurially minded lawyers.

Curriculum

Colorado Law’s curriculum provides its students a competitive advantage amid a changing legal landscape, where many of today’s employers focus on recruiting attorneys with a strong business orientation.

The building blocks for business law include courses such as Contracts, Corporations, and Securities Regulation. These foundational substantive areas remain table stakes for effective business attorneys. Professor Andrew Schwartz, who joined the Colorado Law faculty in 2008, offers the example of Akorn v. Fresenius, a corporate law case out of Delaware.

"Akorn was a landmark corporate case where the court allowed a corporate acquirer to walk away from a $5 billion merger agreement. But that merger agreement was itself just a type of contract, and so the court premised its ruling on foundational principles that we study every year at Colorado Law in the first-year Contracts course,” Schwartz said. (The court cited a UCLA Law Review article by Schwartz in its opinion.)

In addition, practical skills courses such as Transactional Drafting, Deals, Legal Negotiation, Venture Capital and Private Equity, Software Transactions, and Data Analytics require students to transfer skills to the real world. Such courses provide relevant, practical, and valuable information that students will use regardless of their chosen career path.

Venture Capital and Private Equity, taught by Bernthal and local venture capitalist Jason Mendelson since 2008, is a popular course for entrepreneurially minded students, as well as others without a business background who are interested in exploring the world of startups and investment. The course teaches the legal and financial principles relevant to representation of privately held companies, their founders and managers, and their investors.

"We cover startup finance," Bernthal said. “But Jason [Mendelson] is such a gifted communicator with deep expertise that the course could also be titled Startups 101 or How Startup Communities Work. For many students, the VC class provides access to a new world of opportunities surrounding emerging companies."

The VC course attracts a cross-campus mix of 60-70 graduate students each year, with roughly 50 percent of class participants from the law school, 40 percent from the MBA program, and 10 percent from engineering.

"Students respond in such an energetic way that the class has a jazz-like improvisation in the back-and-forth between students and professors," said Bernthal. "Each session has something unexpected and creative."

The course is so valued that students established an endowed scholarship fund in Bernthal’s name and created a separate campus entrepreneurship gift in Mendelson’s honor.

"The VC class was my first look at how businesses are funded and what startups are looking for to scale their businesses," said Jon Milgrom ('15), founder and partner at Milgrom & Daskam. "We negotiated terms for the purchase and sale of equity in a company. This is something I do nearly every day in my current practice. The class was super practical in terms of exposing you to deal structures, entity structures, and industry terms and terminology."

Several alumni of the class have gone on to work in investing or start their own firms or companies: Chris White ('14), founder and CEO of clothing company Shinesty; Cami Yuasa ('14), vice president of bank management at Goldman Sachs; Josh Fitch ('17) and Nick Troxel ('17), founders of Troxel Fitch, LLC; Ben Abell ('11), co-founder of sunglasses company goodr; Shannon Liston ('15), senior corporate counsel at Techstars; and Sierra Moller (’16), corporate counsel at Techstars, to name just a few.

Colorado Law’s business law curriculum also focuses on building students’ "transactional IQ." Transactional IQ is defined as the measure of an individual’s ability to serve as trusted business legal advisor. Colorado Law takes an innovative approach to integrating traditional doctrinal and experiential learning. In Transactional Drafting, a course designed and spearheaded by Legal Writing Professor Amy Bauer in 2010, students learn the principles of contemporary commercial drafting, gaining skills that are applicable to transactional practice and are also useful to future litigators.

"Transactional Drafting shows students how the skills they are learning transfer to the real world and provides relevant, practical, and valuable information that they will use regardless of their chosen career path," said Bauer, who created an Advanced Transactional Drafting course and regularly teaches Colorado Bar Association CLE courses on drafting. She frequently speaks with legal writing faculty at other law schools to encourage them to develop and offer their own drafting courses, as she did.

"Transactional Drafting shows students how the skills they are learning transfer to the real world and provides relevant, practical, and valuable information that they will use regardless of their chosen career path."

Legal Writing Professor Amy Bauer

"In Transactional Drafting, we actually wrote the contracts we analyzed only theoretically in a Contracts course,” said Ali Lipman ('14), an associate at Johnson & Repucci, LLP in �鶹ӰԺ. "In each Legal Negotiation class, we simulated real-world negotiations, which helped us better understand how to effectuate a meaningful agreement. Both of these courses were hands-on and thus immensely helpful in preparing me for client work. Ultimately, these courses made me more confident in my law practice."

Entrepreneurial and business law faculty Sloan Speck, Andrew Schwartz, Mark Loewenstein, Erik Gerding, Amy Bauer, and Brad Bernthal.

Community

Beyond the classroom, experiential opportunities abound for Colorado Law students to hone their business skills. These experiences are enriched by Colorado Law’s location in �鶹ӰԺ, one of the top U.S. cities for startup businesses, and the #GiveFirst mentality that permeates the entrepreneurial ecosystem in �鶹ӰԺ.

#GiveFirst describes a norm of behavior in the Front Range, championed over the past decade by venture capital firm and entrepreneurial network Techstars. It refers to individuals helping others, without any expectation of direct payment in return. #GiveFirst is not pure philanthropy. Rather, it is participation in a system where an individual trusts that benefits provided to others will, over time, indirectly come back to the individual.

Thanks to the generosity of dozens of venture capitalists, entrepreneurs, and attorneys willing to lend an ear, hour, or email, Colorado Law students enjoy invaluable connections in the �鶹ӰԺ-Denver area that often lead to internship, externship, and job opportunities.

"Along with mountains and sun, #GiveFirst is one of the attractions that motivates entrepreneurs to migrate to the Front Range," Bernthal said at a recent entrepreneurship conference hosted by Colorado Law’s Silicon Flatirons Center. "It is a mode of behavior about how exchanges work between people working in the startup scene. In my estimation, it facilitates what Brian Eno calls 'scenius,' which he defines as the communal form of genius."

Jon Milgrom ('15) cites his participation in the Deming Center Venture Fund, which supports emerging companies in �鶹ӰԺ and surrounding communities, as one of his most formative law school experiences. Law students can join the student team, which serves as a venture fund for making seed investments in local companies. Working under the guidance of an experienced advisory board, including David DiGiacomo ('14) and Mike Dornik ('14), and local business leaders, students learn the ins and outs of venture capital and angel investing. Since the program was founded in 2009, nearly 40 Colorado Law students have served as team members and have gone on to work at companies like Zayo, Level III, Cooley LLP, Latham Watkins LLP, McKinsey & Company, Deloitte, Blackstone Entrepreneurs Network, Boomtown, DISH, Greenlite Labs, Greenmont Capital, and Oracle.

"You get pitches from all these different businesses and you have to break down their business plans. Working with an interdisciplinary team that includes students from business, architecture, journalism, and engineering, you collaborate to break down the business plans and ideas and provide entrepreneurship advice, listen to their pitches, and source deals. You’re doing basically what a venture fund does, except we’re making seed investments," Milgrom said.

Through its course offerings, programming, and community partnerships, Colorado Law is giving its students the tools they need to be better allies for the businesses they may one day represent.

"As an attorney, if you can relate to your clients—almost all of which are businesses—you can represent their interests much more effectively," Milgrom said. “This comes up on a daily basis. Understanding business helps you to know what they’re up against and advise them in a more meaningful way."

"As an attorney, if you can relate to your clients—almost all of which are businesses—you can represent their interests much more effectively."

Jon Milgrom ('15)
Founder and partner, Milgrom & Daskam

Sally Hatcher (’97), a serial entrepreneur who co-founded two companies after law school and now advises graduate students interested in pursuing companies, agrees: "Lawyers with business experience understand better than most lawyers what it’s like to be in the trenches and understand the decisions you have to make as an entrepreneur,” she said. “If you understand what your clients are going through, you are going to be a better lawyer because you are going to understand their needs better."

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Removed from the hustle and bustle of teaching, summer is an opportune time for faculty to advance their research and scholarship in collaboration with other legal scholars. Several Colorado Law faculty members hosted workshops and conferences on campus this summer, convening top scholars to share innovative research on legal issues against the scenic backdrop of the Rocky Mountains. 

Conferences like these are among the many ways Colorado Law faculty engage in scholarship and research. Below are highlights of the faculty-hosted �鶹ӰԺ Summer Workshops that took place this summer.

Intersectional Environmentalism Workshop

Moses Lasky Professor of Law Sarah Krakoff hosted the Intersectional Environmentalism Workshop June 14 to address issues of environment, race, and inequality. Participants included Shalanda Baker (Northeastern School of Law), Ann Eisenberg (University of South Carolina School of Law), Sharmila Murthy (Suffolk Law School), and Michalyn Steele (BYU Law School).

Colorado Law alumni and students Edyael Del Carmen Casaperalta ('18), Leah Vasarhelyi ('21), and Natasha Viteri ('21) also participated in the workshop.

"As we hurtle toward surpassing dangerous levels of greenhouse gas emissions and at the same time live in a world marked by extreme economic inequality, the time is right to reshape discussions about environmental law so that they always automatically include questions of inequality, racial discrimination, and redistribution," said Krakoff, who also serves as interim executive director of the Getches-Wilkinson Center for Natural Resources, Energy, and the Environment. "One way to think of this is that we are participating in the broader movement to provide intellectual support for the 'Green New Deal.'"

Early Career Energy Scholars Workshop

On June 14 and 15, Associate Professor Sharon Jacobs hosted the second Early Career Energy Scholars Workshop at Colorado Law. The workshop brings together young energy law scholars from around the country to share and receive feedback on early-stage drafts. This year, participants from nine different law schools attended, workshopping drafts on topics including property rights in oil and gas, wholesale electricity market governance, and energy justice.

Junior Criminal Law Workshop

Organized by Associate Professor Benjamin Levin, the Junior Criminal Law Workshop, held June 29-30, provided an opportunity for junior criminal law and procedure scholars to engage with each other’s work as a supportive, but critical community. Each participant shared a work in progress, and the other participants read and provided feedback. The workshop also served as a site to initiate or continue longer-term conversations about criminal justice scholarship and teaching. Participants included criminal law scholars from Harvard, Yale, NYU, Penn, University of Richmond, Wayne State, and UNLV.

Junior Business Law Colloquium

Associate Professor Brad Bernthal hosted the Junior Business Law Colloquium (JBLC) July 11 and 12. This year’s attendees include business law scholars from Notre Dame, University of Illinois, University of Florida, and several other law schools.

Started by Professor Andrew Schwartz nine years ago, the JBLC is an intimate scholarly workshop for a dozen of the most promising junior business law scholars in the country. Participants must be pre-tenure or have just received tenure. Each participating scholar submits an original piece of scholarship. All participants read each article and provide comments and feedback.

When they weren’t exchanging ideas, the group took in the beauty of �鶹ӰԺ in the summer with a tubing trip down �鶹ӰԺ Creek.

"Five of this year’s JBLC courageous scholars attempted to tube �鶹ӰԺ Creek during their time at Colorado Law.  Only one of the five succeeded. While a few professors took back bruises following the JBLC, everyone was OK. But our guests were humbled by the power of �鶹ӰԺ Creek during a big runoff year," Bernthal said.

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A CU �鶹ӰԺ delegation comprising University of Colorado Law School Dean S. James Anaya, Associate Professor Brad Bernthal ('01), CU Global Ambassador Alan Heath ('68), and representatives from the Chancellor’s Office and schools of education and business, headed to Mexico City June 3-8 to explore opportunities for collaboration in academic programs, student exchanges, internships, executive and continuing education, and constituent engagement.

The team met with local attorneys, higher education representatives, and business leaders to discuss partnership opportunities with CU �鶹ӰԺ.

The trip was part of CU �鶹ӰԺ’s Global Ambassadors Program, which launched in 2016 and aims to engage representatives from the alumni community across the world to deepen CU �鶹ӰԺ’s international strategic engagement. There are 17 CU �鶹ӰԺ alumni serving as global ambassadors in countries as diverse as the United Arab Emirates, Brazil, Japan, and Switzerland; they include Colorado Law alumni Heath and Marty Rolle ('77) in the United Kingdom.

At a workshop with local attorneys organized by Heath, Anaya and Bernthal delivered presentations on their areas of research. Anaya spoke on Corporate Due Diligence and the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and Bernthal discussed The New Startup Investment Structures in the U.S., drawing on his recent article, "The Evolution of Entrepreneurial Finance: A New Typology" published in the BYU Law Review.

"CU �鶹ӰԺ, and Colorado Law, are global in scope. This trip to Mexico City and the Global Ambassadors program are terrific opportunities to expand our international engagement in cooperation with others in the CU �鶹ӰԺ community," Anaya said. "At Colorado Law, one of our strategic imperatives is connecting globally. Trips such as these help us in our mission to pursue initiatives that enable and encourage scholarly inquiry and dialogue on matters of concern across international borders."

Heath, founder The Strategy Group and The Strategy Group—México, a firm specializing in family business and family office advisory with offices in �鶹ӰԺ and México City, helped organize the meetings with local attorneys.

Other participants included School of Education Dean Kathy Schultz, Assistant Vice Chancellor Ryan Chreist, and Leeds School of Business Professor Manuel Laguna.

Learn more about the Global Ambassadors program.

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