Michael Aiello ’22P
Corporate Chairman and M&A Partner Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP
Michael Aiello is Chairman of the over 600-lawyer Corporate Department of Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP and a member of the Firm’s Management Committee. Mr. Aiello regularly represents companies in connection with mergers, acquisitions and divestitures involving public companies. He also advises clients on corporate governance issues. Mr. Aiello regularly represents acquirors, targets, buyout groups, boards of directors, special committees, investment banks, investors and shareholder groups in complex domestic and international negotiated and unsolicited merger and acquisition transactions, including Aéropostale, Dow Chemical, Goldman Sachs, Herbalife, Kroger, Ontario Teachers’, Procter & Gamble, Sanofi, Thomas H. Lee and Willis Group Holdings. Mr. Aiello has counseled clients on a broad range of corporate, securities and business-related matters, including directors’ duties and responsibilities and other aspects of corporate governance, disclosure issues and compliance matters, as well as defensive measures and takeover tactics. He has been included on the 2018, 2017 and 2014 NACD Directorship 100, a list of the 100 most influential people in the boardroom compiled by NACD Directorship magazine.
Mr. Aiello is ranked Band 1 for Corporate/M&A in New York by Chambers Global and Chambers USA, where clients refer to him as “first class” and having “incredible knowledge about any M&A transaction.” Mr. Aiello is also consistently recognized as a leading M&A lawyer by Legal 500 US, IFLR1000 and Best Lawyers in America and has been named to Legal 500’s “Hall of Fame.” In IFLR1000, where he is recognized as a “Market Leader” for M&A, clients have described him as “best in the business.” He has been named an M&A “MVP” multiple times by Law360 and an M&A “Trailblazer” by The National Law Journal, where he was highlighted for his roles in a number of pivotal M&A deals stretching back more than a decade. Mr. Aiello has been named a Dealmaker of the Year and Dealmaker of the Week many times by The American Lawyer for his lead roles on blockbuster M&A transactions. He was the first lawyer ever to be featured as a “Rainmaker” in Institutional Investor, citing his role in shielding clients from the potential collapse of proposed merger and acquisition deals and was selected as one of Crain’s New York Business “40 Under 40” honorees and one of the “40 Business People Under 40 to Watch in 2009” by The Investment Dealers’ Digest. Mr. Aiello was also named one of The National Law Journal’s “40 Under 40” for his work in the mergers and acquisitions area.
Mr. Aiello is an elected Fellow of the American College of Governance Counsel. He has authored several articles discussing the fiduciary duties of corporate directors and officers, recent developments in the areas of mergers and acquisitions and corporate compliance matters, including Sarbanes-Oxley and the related rules adopted by the SEC and the securities exchanges. He is also a frequent lecturer in these areas, and participated in a panel on Developments Affecting M&A Investment Bankers and Their Clients at the Tulane University Law School Annual Corporate Law Institute. Mr. Aiello received the Burton Award for Legal Achievement for his articles, “Bank M&A in the Wake of Dodd-Frank” (The Banking Law Journal, November/December 2010) and “Taking a Hard Look at Poison Pills” (New York Law Journal, November 7, 2005).
