Lila Hope

Lila is a partner in Cooley’s life sciences transactional group and co-chair of the firm’s Women’s Initiative. For 20+ years, she has focused on the representation of life sciences companies discovering, developing and marketing pharmaceutical, vaccine, medical device, diagnostic and digital health products. Lila specializes in transactions involving complex intellectual property, business, operational and legal issues, including strategic partnerships and platform discovery and option deals. In addition, she counsels clients’ management, operational and legal teams on day-to-day matters involving licensing, supply, distribution, clinical trials, research collaborations and vendor services. She also is routinely involved in the evaluation of a company’s product rights and operational risks in connection with financing, public offering and M&A transactions. In addition to her long-established practice in the US, Lila maintains an active practice in cross-border licensing transactions, and she has concluded more than 40 transactions involving Asian biotechnology companies since 2015, including inbound, outbound and newco transactions.

Lila graduated with a JD magna cum laude in 2002 from Duke University School of Law, where she was elected to the Order of the Coif and awarded the Class of 1968 Scholarship. She earned her PhD in cancer biology from Stanford University School of Medicine in 1999, characterizing a novel tumor susceptibility gene as a Stanford Markey Predoctoral Fellow.

Lila is a member of the State Bar of California and the American Bar Association. She has been heavily involved with Duke Law and Stanford Medicine over the past decade, having served as the past president and as a past board member of both the Duke Law Alumni Association and the Stanford Medicine Alumni Association. She currently serves as a member of the Duke Law Board of Visitors.