Alto Litigation
is a San Francisco boutique
representing industry titans throughout the Bay Area. It is
known for its trial-tested ability to
punch well above its weight class against the nation’s largest
firms in several litigation niches,
representing prominent companies and entrepreneurs –
as well as other individual clients – in both defense and plaintiff roles. Principal among the firm’s specialized areas of representation is its securities practice, which is regularly called upon to represent high-profile clients in a variety of matters, including securities class actions and trade
secrets
disputes. The firm draws its vitality from founder and visionary securities trial attorney
Bahram Seyedin-Noor, who has assembled a
talented team of litigators and guided them to prominence in the Golden State. “Alto really espouses this kind of fearless approach,” declares one peer. “It’s
kind of like a knife fight out here [in the Bay Area] for work, but Alto
seems to be getting a seat at the table, finding themselves across from titans like Quinn [Emanuel] and Cooley! Bahram has it all – the drive, the hunger, the right amount of aggression
– but
he also knows when to play it cool and sit back and pay attention, turning observations into his advantage.”
Seyedin-Noor leads a team that
represents Polymath Holdings, a Dubai-based venture capital firm that invested millions in a Silicon Valley start-up that developed wearable wristbands with advanced cloud-based applications for use in healthcare. Upon discovering rampant problems with the technology, the firm
retained Alto. After serving robust corporate books-and-records demands that went unsatisfied, Alto
initiated a multi-pronged assault by simultaneously filing claims against the company, its CEO and CTO, and three related companies in California Superior Court, and filing claims against the company and its CEO in the International Court of Arbitration in the International Chamber of Commerce.
Seyedin-Noor also led a team that
represented a plaintiff in a partnership dispute between an unmarried couple.
The defendant controlled the vast majority of the partnership’s assets and had promised to share those assets with the plaintiff but broke off the romantic relationship and refused to acknowledge the plaintiff’s financial interest in the partnership. “Alto does this type of work,
but this isn’t the usual family law divorce case,”
observes one peer
regarding this case. “There is so much wealth involved with these people that it’s more like a business divorce.”
The Alto team also includes
Bryan
Ketroser, who has served as
Seyedin-Noor’s lieutenant since the firm’s founding, as well as new partner Josh Korr, who makes his debut in this edition of Benchmark as a future star. A peer insists, “List him! He was the best student in his class at UCSF Law School. He had done a stint at
MoFo [Morrison & Foerster] and he was tired of it. He
didn’t want
to grind it out and wanted some real work.
He’s a real ‘right-and-left brain’ person. He’s a brilliant writer – he writes these pithy and sometimes funny complaints.
He’s also a musician – he always has a band and he’s
very creative.”
