William J. Bernat

William J. Bernat is the deputy chair of Nutter’s Corporate and Transactions Department. He co-chairs the firm's Emerging Companies Group and co-leads the firm's Food and Beverage group. Clients routinely rely on Will to help them navigate through private equity, venture capital, and angel financing transactions, as well as mergers and acquisitions, commercial lending transactions, and other corporate governance issues.

Tech, life sciences, consumer/retail, and food & beverage companies look to Will for assistance throughout their entire lifespans, from initial planning and formation to operations and exit, including formulating the strategy to realize their business goals and to build the foundation necessary to secure third party investment. Investors in emerging growth companies seek Will’s counsel when structuring their financing transactions. Will has counseled clients in angel and venture backed financings representing an aggregate of over $500 million in investment in local early stage companies.

Banks and other financial institutions rely on Will’s expertise when structuring asset-based and other commercial lending transactions with both emerging and entrepreneurial companies and more mature borrowers. Will has guided both lenders and borrowers through transactions representing aggregate commitments in excess of $1 billion.

A leader in Boston’s innovation and startup community, Will serves on the partners’ committee of, and is a frequent lecturer and panel member at, The Capital Network, a nonprofit organization that brings together Boston’s largest active community of investors and startup experts to provide practical, hands-on education and personalized mentoring to young entrepreneurs to help them navigate the fundraising process. In addition, Will serves as a mentor and holds regular office hours at MassChallenge, a startup accelerator, and Golden Seeds, one of the nation’s most active early-stage investment firms.

Will frequently serves as a lecturer and guest speaker at the MIT Enterprise Forum, the Babson Entrepreneurship Forum, and Massachusetts Continuing Legal Education, where he presents on topics such as the fundamentals of term sheets and capitalization tables, and general corporate finance and formation issues.