Steve Sencer, who most recently served as the Senior Vice President and General Counsel at Emory University, joined Ropes & Gray today as counsel. He will be part of the firm’s health care and higher education practices.

Steve brings to Ropes & Gray significant experience in scientific and clinical research and technology transfer. At Emory, he served as the chief legal officer for both Emory University and Emory Healthcare, a wholly owned health system with 12 hospitals and over 2,000 physicians, as well as affiliated entities such as The Carter Center and DRIVE, Emory’s nonprofit drug development company.

Steve led numerous successful health care-focused initiatives while at Emory. His accomplishments include:

• leading a $540 million securitization of a HIV drug royalty stream.
• creating the corporate structure for the nonprofit drug development company Drug Innovation Ventures at Emory, LLC (DRIVE) and its wholly owned non-profit subsidiary Emory Innovations, Inc (EII).
• helping to form the Emory Vaccine Center in New Delhi, India and the Queensland Emory Drug Discovery Initiative in Australia, designed to translate academic research into drug development candidates for clinical trials in cancer, Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases.

“Steve is well-known and highly regarded within the health care, higher education and life sciences sectors. He has handled a full array of complex legal matters in scientific research, government grants, and technology transfer, including Bayh-Dole and related regulatory issues” said Mark Barnes, Ropes & Gray health care partner and renowned practitioner in issues related to biomedical and other academic research and federal research grants.

“Ropes & Gray is known for successfully advising major health care, life sciences and university clients on critical strategic, operational, complex regulatory matters to position them for growth and success,” said Steve. “I could not be joining a better team and look forward to advising the firm’s world-class clients in their most ambitious matters.”