David P. Wales

Mr. Wales’ practice focuses on providing antitrust advice to U.S. and international clients in a wide range of industries on all aspects of antitrust-related matters, including mergers and acquisitions, alliances, criminal grand jury investigations, dominant firm conduct, distribution arrangements, licensing and competitor collaborations. 

Mr. Wales has the distinctive experience of previously serving as a senior official in both U.S. antitrust agencies. Most recently, he served as acting director of the Bureau of Competition (2008-09) during a three-year tenure at the Federal Trade Commission, where he oversaw all of the agency’s antitrust enforcement activity, including in the health care, pharmaceutical, oil and gas, technology, chemical, defense, retail and consumer product industries. He also served as counsel to the assistant attorney general in the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division (2001-03), where he was part of the small front-office team managing all of the agency’s merger and conduct matters. Mr. Wales also is co-chair of the Antitrust Council at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

Mr. Wales’ numerous antitrust representations for clients in M&A transactions include:

• S&P Global in the sale of its Engineering Solutions business to funds managed by KKR
• CommScope in its $7.4 billion acquisition of ARRIS International plc
• Microsoft Corp. in its:
  •  $20 billion acquisition of Nuance Communications
  • acquisition of Xandr from AT&T
• Sabre Corporation in the Justice Department’s challenge of its proposed acquisition of FareLogix
• Performance Food Group in its successful $2 billion acquisition of Reinhart Foodservice
• Nasdaq in the sale of its U.S. fixed income business to Tradeweb Markets
• Wesco Aircraft in its $1.9 billion merger with Platinum Equity affiliate Pattonair
• ABB in the $2.9 billion sale of its mechanical power transmission business to RBC Bearings Inc.
• Newell Brands in the sale of its Connected Home & Security business to Resideo Technologies
• Maui Jim in the sale of the company to Kering Eyewear
• Dassault Systèmes in its $5.8 billion acquisition of Medidata Solutions, Inc.
• Roper Technologies in the $365 million acquisition of EPSi from Allscripts by its affiliate Strata Decision Technology
• StandardAero’s $230 million acquisition of Global Engine Services business from Signature Aviation
• Wells Fargo in connection with the pending carve-out sale of its Institutional Retirement & Trust business to Principal Financial Group
• The Scotts Miracle-Gro Company in connection with subsidiary Hawthorne Gardening’s $450 million purchase of Sunlight Supply
• one of the world’s largest technology companies subject to the FTC’s 6(b) investigation of nonreportable deals over the past decade
• TravelCenters of America’s $330 million sale of its Minit Mart convenience store business to EG Group

In addition to transactional matters, Mr. Wales represents clients in antitrust litigation, cartels and other types of government investigations, including representations for one of the world’s largest technology companies, Boeing, John Deere, Cardinal Health and others.

Mr. Wales also is consistently ranked as a leading antitrust practitioner in Chambers USA: America’s Leading Lawyers for Business, Chambers Global: The World’s Leading Lawyers for Business, The Legal 500, The Best Lawyers in America and Lawdragon, which has recognized him repeatedly as one of its 500 Leading Litigators in America.