RESEARCH & ANALYSIS FIRM OF THE YEAR

Don May Managing Partner

DMA Economics

1-212-390-0595 www.dmaeconomics.com dmay@dmaeconomics.com

Don May is Managing Partner at DMA Economics LLC and possesses over 30 years’ experience in consulting, valuation, and litigation support as well as researching, publishing and teaching at the university level. His experience includes implementing a broad range of damage analyses and valuations for businesses of various sizes and in numerous industries. Prior to founding DMA Economics in 2015, Dr. May was Managing Director at Berkley Research Group and the Principal in charge of valuation and litigation support services for a regional accounting firm, a Managing Director for PricewaterhouseCoopers, and a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology - Sloan School of Management.

Dr. May has prepared expert reports and testified in federal and state courts as well as AAA, JAMS, and FINRA arbitration hearings and has effectively communicated as an expert witness testifier and consultant in several multimillion-dollar cases.

Dr. May has been published in several distinguished academic and practitioner journals such as The Journal of Finance, The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Hedge Fund Law Review, and is currently an editorial board member of The Journal of Business Valuation and Economic Loss Analysis.

Some examples of recent matters

Dr. May has been asked to evaluate, analyse and/or opine on include the valuation of damages related to:

• ERISA and shareholder portfolio mismanagement and fraud damages calculations

• Lost profits and enterprise value resulting from product defects

• Lost profits and enterprise value resulting from breach of contract

• Theft of trade secrets, trade dress and other intellectual property

• Hedge fund valuation and hedge fund member interest valuation

• Product mislabelling and false advertising Accounting misstatements for private and public businesses

• Securities fraud under SEC Section 10b-5 and Section 11

• Post-Merger valuation disputes

Additionally, Dr. May has also performed valuations of over 200 closely held businesses and interests in those businesses across numerous industries for financial reporting and estate planning.

M&A ADVISER OF THE YEAR

Frank Vargas Partner Rimon +1 650.352.3932

frank.vargas@rimonlaw.com

Frank Vargas is a partner at Rimon Law. Mr. Vargas has been a lawyer for more than 36 years focusing on Technology transactions including mergers and acquisitions. He has completed more than five hundred transactions during his career ranging from a few million to over a billion dollars of transaction value. Mr. Vargas also held executive leadership positions at several investment banks where he headed up Corporate finance including Mergers and Acquisition advising. Mr. Vargas has lectured lawyers on Mergers and Acquisitions and other topics and is an adjunct professor at Santa Clara law school where he coteaches a course in Start Up Law and Business Organizations. Mr. Vargas received his undergraduate degree from Harvard University with honors and his JD and MBA from the University of California Berkeley. Mr. Vargas has been a member of the Hispanic Bar Association in Minnesota and mentored Hispanic and Native American lawyers throughout his career.

Mr. Vargas, completed more than forty transaction in the last four years, including projects ranging from a few million to several hundred million dollars. For example, Mr. Vargas recently completed a complex multinational transaction where his client sold some assets to one buyer and sold its stock to another buyer in two transactions which closed within weeks of each other with combined value of approximately ninety million dollars. He also completed another multinational transaction involving a multinational holding company with an aggregate value in excess of two hundred fifty million dollars involving companies in six countries.

Mr. Vargas is part of Rimon’s robust Mergers and Acquisitions practice. Rimon’s M&A attorneys advise clients on mergers, acquisitions, sale of control transactions, business combinations, takeover defenses, and joint ventures. We advise our clients through all stages of their transactions, from initial structuring through negotiation and close.

We work with clients to create innovative solutions for all types of transactions – from routine to complex, local to cross-border, and for both public and private companies. Many of our clients are startup and high-growth companies with which we have had relationships, representing them in their formation, operations, and the financing that helped bring them to successful exit. With attorneys located in key financial markets around the world, we are a truly global team and can provide informed counsel on domestic and cross-border transactions, wherever they may be.

Our clients span a broad range of industries, including financial services, engineering, telecommunications, media, aerospace, healthcare, cannabis, software, and biotechnology. We have provided counsel on mergers and acquisitions ranging from small business sales and combinations to multi-billiondollar transactions.

Rimon is a tech-enabled, highly selective, global law firm, consistently recognized for its excellence, innovation, and teamwork throughout its 47 offices in 11 countries and five continents. Rimon’s streamlined and distributed model allows for greater efficiency and collaboration to better serve our clients. Rimon was designed to optimize quality, teamwork, and innovation, without the usual inefficiencies of the conventional law firm model. We removed the bureaucracy, politics, wasteful spending, and internal conflicts that came with the old pyramid model. Instead, we focused on recruiting top-tier legal talent, giving them the freedom to serve our clients with ease, and equipping them with all the resources they need to work closely together as a team.

Conan J. Higgins President & Founder

TSI Legal Enterprises, PC

+1 202-798-4822

conan.higgins@tsilegalenterprises.com

1113

Mayflower Rd NE, Townsend, GA 31331

- Company name

TSI Legal Enterprises, PC

- What year was your company founded and by who?

The company was founded in January 2012 by Conan Higgins, a decorated combat veteran, who wanted to create a vehicle for expeditionary legal work.

I am a licensed attorney, admitted to practice in California, Washington, D.C., and the Court of International Trade. I am a Certified Project Management Professional as well as being certified in SCRUM Fundamentals and as a Human Trafficking Investigator. I am a Fellow of the Institute of Leadership and Management and an Associate member of the Chartered Institute of Legal Executives in the United Kingdom. I have been recognized as a subject matter expert in the field of international business entity creation and regularly contributed to the World Bank/ International Monetary Fund’s annual “Doing Business” report covering business best practices in 189 economies. I have been selected for High Honors recognition by the Washington, D.C. Bar for my pro bono work during 2021. I served for 6 years as the Vice Chair for the American Bar Association’s Section of International Law Middle East Committee and previously as Vice Chair for the International AntiMoney Laundering Committee. Education credentials include a B.A. in Organizational Leadership from Chapman University, a Juris Doctorate from Concord Law School, an LL.M. with Merit in International Business Law from the University of Liverpool, numerous graduate certificates in mediation and negotiation mastery from both Harvard Law School and Harvard Business School, and I am currently pursuing a doctorate (Ph.D.) in International Law and Treaty

Law through Euclid University. My published works include a dissertation on “Improving Corporate Governance Education in Emerging Markets in SubSaharan Africa” and a review on anti-money laundering practices in Afghanistan for the American Bar Association.

- Please outline your company

TSI Legal Enterprises, PC focuses on International Business law, specifically in emerging markets and under-served economies, by providing legal and business advisement on subjects ranging from the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), Import/Export Compliance and International Trafficking in Arms Regulations (ITAR) to international mergers/ acquisitions, contract negotiations, drafting, and execution, legal project management, and corporate governance.

- Are there any challenges you have had to overcome and how did you overcome these?

Each country presents unique and singular challenges based on cultural differences, local customs and practices, industry standards, and of course, that country’s laws. Learning to navigate these differences by studying the country allows for more meaningful guidance and representation. By working together with host-national attorneys and business leaders, I have been able to quickly understand the nuances of the local legal/business environment, which has enabled me to better develop a plan to advise my clients successfully.

A major challenge which recurs frequently is avoiding running afoul of the FCPA or similar laws such as the UK Bribery Act 2010 or the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign