Monroe-Sheridan Foreign Law Office represented forest Inc. as U.S. counsel in forest’s JPY 900 million (approx. $8 million) seed financing round, announced on November 24. The University of Tokyo Edge Capital Partners (UTEC) and Nordstar Partners led the financing. The financing was covered in TechCrunch and the Nikkei newspaper. From…
Reid Monroe-Sheridan and Rebecca Liao co-authored a whitepaper, “Primer on the DLPC: A Standard for Payment Commitments on the Blockchain,” published by CodeX: The Center for Legal Informatics Stanford University. The article provides an overview of the Distributed Ledger Payment Commitment, or DLPC. The DLPC is a standardized blockchain-based payment…
Monroe-Sheridan Foreign Law Office advised Mizuho Bank in connection with the use of blockchain-based distributed ledger payment commitments in certain metal commodities transactions, which were publicly announced on August 24, 2021. The press release announcing the transactions is available here: https://www.baft.org/press-releases/currency-agnostic-blockchain-debuts-for-global-trade/ From the press release: Metal commodities worth around $43…
Monroe-Sheridan Foreign Law Office represented Reborna Biosciences, Inc. in its research collaboration with Biogen Inc. The research collaboration was publicly announced on April 30, 2021. The press release announcing the research collaboration is available here: https://rebornabiosciences.com/en/news/1023 From the press release: “Biogen is a leading company in the field of neurological…
Reid Monroe-Sheridan contributed an article, “Legal Risks and Mitigation Strategies Relating to Insolvent American Startups” in the May 15, 2020 edition of New Business Law. The article describes typical measures that startups take to address insolvency, certain key risks that these measures may raise for Japanese investors and commercial counterparties,…
On September 28, Reid Monroe-Sheridan presented his latest research project, “Promoting Legal Innovation in Japanese Startup Financing” at the New Perspectives in Japanese Law conference at Harvard Law School. The research, which is forthcoming in the Journal of International Commercial Law (Spring 2019), analyzes the nature and progress of contractual…
On September 27, Reid Monroe-Sheridan spoke to students at Harvard Law School about career opportunities for American-qualified lawyers in Japan. The event was organized by the Harvard Asia Law Society.
On May 30, Reid Monroe-Sheridan participated in a panel discussion on “Working as a Sole Practitioner in Tokyo” hosted by Women in Law Japan at the headquarters of Amazon Japan.
On November 1, Reid Monroe-Sheridan participated in a panel discussion on registering as a foreign lawyer in Japan hosted by the American Chamber of Commerce in Japan (ACCJ) at the ACCJ’s Tokyo office.
On May 14, Reid Monroe-Sheridan, Anri Okamoto and Neil Nguyen provided a startup law and operations seminar for entrepreneurs in Tokyo.
Anri Okamoto is in-house counsel for Mercari Inc. and Neil Nguyen is the founder and CEO of Tokyo Academics. The theme of the seminar was an introduction to legal and operational concepts relevant to entrepreneurs in Tokyo.
