Chris Holly

Partner
Full contact info

I love practicing at the intersection of science and the law. It's where I am with my clients on a daily basis. Helping clients create value and secure innovations is central to my work.

Passions

SCUBA diving and anything involving salt water

Collecting old jazz vinyl LPs

Oenophile – WSET Diploma candidate

 

Experience

Cooley Advises AgroSpheres on Series B Financing

April 24, 2023

Cooley advised AgroSpheres on its $22 million Series B financing and led intellectual property due diligence in connection with the round. Cooley counsels AgroSpheres with respect to corporate matters and is the architect behind development of the company’s ever-expanding patent portfolio.

AgroSpheres’ biomanufacturing platform enables cost-effective manufacturing and successful field application of novel biological modalities. The unprecedented field success of foliar-applied AgriCell-RNAi technologies has garnered significant industry interest.

“In this unprecedented bear market, food security, environmental footprint, and supply chain resilience are of paramount importance,” said Payam Pourtaheri, founder and CEO of AgroSpheres. “We are thankful for the support from our partners at Lewis & Clark, OAS, Bidra, and Cavallo, as we take significant strides towards our vision of a future built by nature’s technologies and bring our biobased technologies to partners globally.”

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Chris Holly
Partner, Washington DC

Related Practices & Industries

Cooley builds patent estate for Zymergen’s HTP genomic engineering and synthetic biology platform

July 27, 2021

Cooley has served as primary IP counsel to Zymergen since its founding, helping the company to navigate IP diligence through various funding rounds and establish a robust IP estate. Zymergen, a synthetic biology and biofacturing company developing molecules used in industries including agriculture, chemicals, materials, pharmaceuticals, electronics and more, recently had a successful debut on the public markets with a NASDAQ listing in 2021.

Cooley’s IP team provides guidance on all aspects of IP matters, helping the company to protect its foundational high-throughput genomic engineering platform and various contributions to the field of synthetic biology.

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Chris Holly
Partner, Washington DC

Related Practices & Industries

Cooley advises food industry pioneer Nobell Foods on patent matters

July 27, 2021

Cooley has served as primary IP counsel to Nobell Foods since its founding, helping the company to protect its innovative contributions aimed at making the world’s food systems more humane and sustainable. Nobell Foods is utilizing the power of plants to reimagine the world’s food supply and produce delicious cheese from plant-derived dairy proteins. The company recently completed a $75 million Series B in 2021 to help bring its vision to the world.

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Chris Holly
Partner, Washington DC

Related Practices & Industries

AppHarvest Acquires Root AI

March 9, 2021

Cooley advised AppHarvest, a leading public agtech company and certified B Corp, on its acquisition of Root AI, an AI farming startup that creates intelligent robots to help manage high-tech indoor farms. In addition to advising on corporate matters, Cooley's IP team handled all patent due diligence aspects of the deal. Partner Josh Holleman led the Cooley team advising AppHarvest.

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Caitlin Cunningham
Associate, Colorado
Joshua Holleman
Partner, Washington DC
Dennis F. Craig II
Associate, Washington DC
MaryBeth Shreiner
Associate, Reston
Chelsea André
Associate, Colorado
Chris Holly
Partner, Washington DC
Xander Lee
Partner, Los Angeles Santa Monica
TJ Graham
Partner, Palo Alto
Derek Colla
Partner, Washington DC

Related Practices & Industries

Cooley advises Provivi on $45.5M Series C-2 Round

January 8, 2021

Cooley advised emerging crop protection company Provivi on its $45.5 million series C-2 financing round led by Vivo Capital, with participation from returning shareholders. Provivi has developed a truly disruptive technological platform that enables the scalable production of environmentally friendly insect pheromone products. These products are able to naturally disrupt the mating cycle of insect pests and reduce the current overreliance upon non-sustainable synthetic insecticides. "The Series C-2 financing is a new milestone in the growth of our company. It builds upon a very successful year where Provivi achieved several product registrations worldwide and launched our first product commercially in Mexico," said Dr. Pedro Coelho, cofounder and CEO of Provivi.

Related contacts

Chris Holly
Partner, Washington DC
Rachel Proffitt
Partner, San Francisco
Rachel M. Burns
Associate, San Francisco
Julia Gage
Associate, San Francisco
Ron Metzger
Paralegal Specialist, San Francisco
Marcelo Pomeranz
Associate, San Diego
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Rankings & accolades

Chambers USA: Intellectual Property: Patent Prosecution – District of Columbia (2021 – 2023)

Fellows of the American Bar Foundation: Elected Member

Seed World: Top Ten Next Generation Leaders

Super Lawyers: Rising Star

The National Law Journal: Rising Star

Memberships & affiliations

American Intellectual Property Law Association

American Seed Trade Association

Patent & Trademark Office Society

Seed Innovation and Protection Alliance

Chris is regularly retained by clients in the agricultural sector for strategic IP advice. As one client notes, “Chris is amazing to work with - he is extremely responsive and understands our technology and our strategy. He is very strategic and thinks outside of the box."

Chambers USA 2022