Erik Knudsen is a corporate partner and serves as co-chair of the firm's global Mergers & Acquisitions Practice. He is also a member of the Private Equity Buyouts & Investment Group.
Erik focuses his practice on complex business transactions, including leveraged buyouts, strategic mergers, acquisitions, investments and joint ventures, reorganizations, growth equity and venture capital investments, and divestitures.
With a broad industry reach, Erik has led transactions in diverse sectors such as healthcare, industrial, software, internet, technology, business services, distribution, and manufacturing. His industry‑specific knowledge and comprehensive understanding of the private equity market and corporate counsel requirements position him as a trusted advisor for clients navigating complex business landscapes.
AccentCare
Advised AccentCare’s management team in the sale of AccentCare from Oak Hill Capital to Advent International.
Alpine Investors
Advised Alpine Investors in multiple transactions including its acquisition of Wilson Language Learning.
Avalign Technologies and RoundTable Healthcare Partners
Advised Avalign Technologies and RoundTable Healthcare Partners in leveraged buyouts of Advantis Medical, Nemcomed, and NGInstruments.
Bain Capital
Advised Bain Capital in the sale of FCI Burndy to Hubbell.
Bioniche Pharma and RoundTable Healthcare Partners
Advised Bioniche Pharma and RoundTable Healthcare Partners in various product acquisitions and development projects.
BlackBerry
Advised BlackBerry in its $1.4 billion acquisition and subsequent sale of Cylance.
Bow River Capital
Advised Bow River Capital’s Software Growth Equity Fund in multiple transactions, including its majority investments in Product Plan and Accelo and its acquisition of RippleWorx.
California Cryobank
Advised California Cryobank in its acquisition of Donor Egg Bank and its sale to GI Partners.
Ciber
Advised Ciber in multiple transactions, including sale of Infor practice to Infor and the 363 sale of U.S. and Indian businesses to HTC Global.
Consortium of investors
Advised a consortium of investors (including CVCI and ABN AMRO) in the sale of Mobiltel to Telekom Austria.
Copain Wines
Advised Copain Wines in the sale to Jackson Family Wines.
CorePharma and RoundTable Healthcare Partners
Advised CorePharma and RoundTable Healthcare Partners in product acquisitions from GlaxoSmithKline.
DigiCert
Advised Digicert’s management team in the sale of Digicert to Clearlake Capital and TA Associates.
Divvy
Advised Divvy in its $2.5 billion sale to Bill.com
Envision Healthcare Holdings, Inc.
Advised Envision Healthcare Holdings, Inc. in its operating subsidiaries and affiliates in multiple transactions, including the acquisitions of Horizon Eye Specialists, Emergency Physicians Medical Group, Northwest Tucson Emergency Physicians, Questcare Medical Services, Emergency Medical Associates of New Jersey, Scottsdale Emergency Associates, Phoenix Physicians, Life Line Ambulance Service, and Guardian Healthcare Group.
Excellere Partners
Advised Excellere Partners in multiple transactions, including its investment in Concord Technologies.
Flying J
Advised Flying J in various asset sales in connection with its Chapter 11 reorganization.
Francisco Partners
Advised Francisco Partners in the leveraged buyout of Ichor Systems.
GKN
Advised GKN in the acquisition of Teleflex Aerospace Manufacturing Group.
GLP Pte. Ltd.
Advised GLP Pte. Ltd. in multiple transactions, including the acquisition of a $4.55 billion U.S. logistics portfolio from Industrial Income Trust.
GREE International
Advised GREE International, the Western arm of GREE, in the acquisition of DragonSoul, the critically acclaimed mobile role-playing game (RPG) developed by PerBlue, and in sale of War of Nations to RockYou.
Greenlane Holdings
Advised Greenlane Holdings in its acquisitions of DaVinci and Eyce, and its merger with KushCo.
GTCR and Devicor Medical Products
Advised GTCR and Deviocor Medical Products in the leveraged buyout of Breast Care Business of Ethicon Endo-Surgery.
Health Evolution Partners
Advised Health Evolution Partners in the leveraged buyout of Freedom Innovations.
Huck Capital
Advised Huck Capital in its partnership with Schneider Electric.
IDIQ
Advised IDIQ in its sale of 51% of IDIQ to affiliates of Corsair Capital.
Industrial Growth Partners
Advised Industrial Growth Partners in the sale of O’Brien Corp to Ametek.
Longitude Capital and NovaQuest Capital
Advised Longitude Capital and NovaQuest Capital in the leveraged buyout of California Cryobank.
NerdWallet
Advised NerdWallet in its acquisition of Fundera.
Odyssey Investment Partners
Advised Odyssey Investment Partners and its management in the sale of Norcross Safety Products to Honeywell.
Olympus Partners
Advised Olympus Partners in multiple transactions, including the equity and subordinated debt investment in Atlas Industrial Services and leveraged buyout of Norwesco.
Onsemi
Advised onsemi (Nasdaq: ONNN) in multiple transactions, including in the acquisition of the East Fishkill Facility from Global Foundries, the acquisitions of Aptina Imaging and GT Advanced Technologies, the divestiture of the Ignition IGBT Business, and the sale of the Transient Voltage Suppressor and Thyristor Business to Littelfuse, Inc.
OWP/P
Advised OWP/P in the merger with Cannon Design.
Rothschild & Co.
Advised Rothschild & Co. in its agreement to sell two asset management units to Wintrust Financial Corporation’s subsidiary Great Lakes Advisors, LLC.
RoundTable Healthcare Partners
Advised RoundTable Healthcare Partners in multiple transactions, including the leveraged buyout of Aqua Pharmaceuticals, the sale of Bioniche Pharma to Mylan, and the sale of MedAssist to Firstsource.
Rubicon Technology Partners
Advised Rubicon Technology Partners in multiple transactions, including its strategic majority investments in EverTrue and ThankView and merger thereof, its strategic majority investments in Enquire, Glennis Solutions and Sherpa CRM and merger thereof.
Sensata Technologies
Advised Sensata Technologies in the acquisition of Honeywell’s “Automotive on Board” sensors business.
Silver Lake Sumeru
Advised Silver Lake Sumeru in multiple transactions, including the equity investment in Opera Solutions and sale of i2 Holdings Limited to IBM.
SoftBank
Advised SoftBank in multiple transactions, including the initial $1.26 billion acquisition of a controlling interest in Miami-based Brightstar Corp. and a subsequent second-step transaction to acquire the remaining outstanding interests, the establishment of GreenBox Systems LLC, a new joint venture with Symbotic Inc. (Nasdaq: SYM) to offer the first-of-its-kind automated warehouse services, and the formation of a 50/50 joint venture with Tempus AI focused on the business of performing clinical sequencing in Japan.
Tomkins Ltd.
Advised Tomkins Ltd. in multiple transactions, including the sale of Dexter Axle to Sterling Partners and in sale of Aquatic U.S. Holdings to Sterling Partners.
Unity Technologies
Advised Unity Technologies in its acquisition of Obvioos.
Vector Capital
Advised Vector Capital in the leveraged buyout of Motorola Solutions’ Point-to-Point and Point‑to‑Multipoint Wireless Broadband Networks businesses.
Versa Capital
Advised Versa Capital in the acquisition of assets of InPhonic.
Westfire
Advised Westfire in the sale to Tyco SimplexGrinnell.
Windjammer Capital
Advised Windjammer Capital in the leveraged buyout of JWC Environmental.
York Capital and JMA Ventures
Advised York Capital and JMA Ventures in the buyout of the Bay Club Co.
Legal 500 US 2022
Ranked Practice: M&A / Corporate and Commercial: Private Equity Buyouts
Legal 500 US 2024
Individual recommended for M&A / Corporate and Commercial: M&A: Large Deals ($1BN+)
Law360 2021
Private Equity Practice Group of the Year