Biography: Competition

Mr Sohn's practice focuses on the antitrust aspects of mergers and acquisitions, as well as government and private antitrust litigation and investigations. He is widely recognised for his involvement in sensitive and complex antitrust matters, particularly with regard to facilitating innovative agreements between companies and reviewing government authorities.

Mr Sohn has represented clients such as Wyeth, GE, Merck, Nasdaq, Emerson, Comcast, Palm, PricewaterhouseCoopers and PepsiCo in merger investigations and litigation before the FTC and the Justice Department.

He also provides general antitrust counselling for a variety of clients, including GE and Forest Laboratories.

He served as general counsel of the Federal Trade Commission from 1977 to 1980.

Mr Sohn joined Davis Polk from a major Washington law firm where he led the antitrust practice for many years.

Among his most significant representations were the successful settlement in the FTC's 1998 monopolisation suit against Intel; the approved US$27.2 billion acquisition of Guidant by Boston Scientific; the approved US$60 billion acquisition of Aventis by Sanofi; and the acquisition of Quaker Oats by PepsiCo.

Recent representations include CVS Caremark in connection with its successful US$1.25 billion acquisition of the Medicare prescription drug business of Universal American; Forest Laboratories Inc in connection with its US$1.2 billion acquisition of Clinical Data Inc; PepsiCo in the approved acquisitions of its two leading bottlers; Comcast in connection with the NBCUniversal joint venture; Palm in connection with its sale to HP; Equinix in its acquisition of Switch and Data; and Emerson Electric in the sale of its motor division.

Mr Sohn is listed as a leading lawyer in several legal industry publications, including: Chambers USA and Chambers Global; The Legal 500 US; Practical Law Company's Which lawyer?; and Legal Media Group's Benchmark Litigation. He was named 'Lawyer of the Year' in Washington DC Administrative/Regulatory Law and Washington DC Litigation – Mergers & Acquisitions in 2012 by Best Lawyers. Davis Polk's antitrust group was also named a 'Competition Group of the Year' for 2011 by Law360.

He earned his BA in history from Columbia College, and his LLB from Harvard Law School.