Bio

Simone Collins is a partner of Sklar Kirsh LLP in the Corporate Department. Simone’s practice focuses on mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures and other complex investment and strategic business transactions. Simone has extensive experience advising private companies, private equity firms and their portfolio companies, business owners and investors with the structuring and negotiation of domestic and cross-border transactions, including stock and asset acquisitions and dispositions, leveraged buyouts, strategic add-ons, debt and equity financings, and other general corporate and business matters. Simone also has experience representing start-up entities, founders and entrepreneurs with entity formation, early stage financing rounds and exit planning. She has represented clients in a broad array of industries, including media and entertainment, technology, hospitality/restaurants, retail and consumer products, professional services, and manufacturing and industrials. Prior to joining Sklar Kirsh LLP, Simone was an associate in the Corporate Group of Latham & Watkins LLP in Los Angeles. At Latham, her practice focused on mergers and acquisitions, leveraged buyouts, strategic add-ons and joint venture transactions for public and private companies and private equity firms. From 2012 to 2014, Simone was an associate in the Private Equity/M&A Group of Jones Day LP in Chicago, where her practice focused on mergers and acquisitions and other private equity transactions, as well as joint ventures and venture capital financing. Prior to attending law school, Simone worked as a financial advisor in the corporate restructuring and recovery department of a global consulting firm. Born in Cape Town, South Africa, and raised in New Jersey, Simone received a Bachelor of Science in Finance, cum laude, from the University of Maryland. While at Maryland, Simone was a four-year varsity letter winner and starter on the Division I women’s soccer team, earning All-ACC Academic Team Honors and First Team CoSIDA Academic All-District Honors. Simone also received the University of Maryland Scholar Athlete Award for athletic and academic excellence. Simone later received her Juris Doctorate, cum laude, from Northwestern Pritzker School of Law, where she was a member of, and published author in, the Northwestern Journal of International Law and Business, and a winner of the Arlyn Miner Book Award for excellence in persuasive legal writing.