Brendan Benedict

Brendan is a generalist litigator with a focus in antitrust and commercial litigation.  He represents both plaintiffs and defendants.  Since 2018, Brendan has been on teams that tried three matters involving antitrust claims or defenses, winning both that reached a judgment.  In the same span, he has represented claimants in settlements with a combined value of over $5 billion and a defendant in a multiparty settlement with an aggregate value exceeding $26 billion. 

Since launching his firm in June 2021, Brendan's clients have included a public company (SunPower), a government (the State of Utah), a small business (Procore Products, Inc.), leading non-profit organizations (Asian Americans Advancing Justice | AAJC, Espacios Abiertos, the Fred T. Korematsu Center for Law and Equality, the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, the National Freedom of Information Coalition, and the Open Markets Institute), and individuals. At Cravath, Brendan's clients included Allied World Assurance Company, Credit Suisse, Precision Castparts, and Qualcomm, among others.

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Lead Counsel & First-Chair Experience​

Trial Litigation

• Secured complete dismissal for Complete Solaria, Inc. (now d/b/a SunPower) as lead defense counsel in a putative class action in the Commercial Division of New York Supreme Court seeking repricing of warrants issued in connection with a de-SPAC transaction. Brendan argued the motion to dismiss, and Justice Melissa A. Crane complimented the "good lawyering that went into this motion."

• Represented Procore Products, Inc. as lead plaintiff's counsel in a breach of contract arbitration before the American Arbitration Association, which was resolved favorably.

• Brendan also recently represented the State of Utah as a Special Assistant Attorney General with the Antitrust & Data Privacy Section of the Attorney General's Office in the multistate antitrust suit against Google challenging its Play Store practices.  In that capacity, Brendan helped lead the States' offensive and expert discovery; briefed the oppositions to Google's motions to stay trial (denied) and exclude the States' economist, Marc Rysman; prepared Dr. Rysman for a still-rare "hot tub" hearing on Google's Daubert motion, which Bloomberg noted he "appeared to survive"; and deposed two Google experts, five Google executives, the former CEO of GetJar, and a Qualcomm executive. 

  • The model presented by Dr. Rysman calculating damages from lost app variety is believed to be among the first quantifications of so-called "non-price effects" in an antitrust damages model–as one Susman Godfrey partner put it, an "innovation" for plaintiffs.  For his work in the Play Store litigation, Dr. Rysman was shortlisted for the Global Competition Review's 2024 award for economist of the year.

Appellate Litigation

• Counsel of record for the Open Markets Institute as amicus curiae supporting the cert petition by class plaintiffs in the U.S. Supreme Court in litigation alleging that Merck unlawfully extended a monopoly for the mumps vaccine.

• Counsel of record for originalist scholars Evan Bernick and Jed Shugerman as amici curiae in support of birthright citizenship in the First and Fourth Circuits.

• Counsel of record for professor Alexi Pfeffer-Gillett as amicus curiae in support of plaintiffs in an antitrust class action against American Express in the First Circuit.

• Counsel of record for economist Evan Starr as amicus curiae supporting the Federal Trade Commission in the Fifth Circuit appeal over the FTC's noncompete rulemaking. 

• Counsel of record for Asian Americans Advancing Justice | AAJC and the Fred T. Korematsu Center for Law and Equality as amici curiae supporting no party in the U.S. Supreme Court in TikTok's consolidated challenge to the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act. 

• Counsel of record for Espacios Abiertos as amicus curiae in the U.S. Supreme Court in briefing contesting the applicability of sovereign immunity for members of the Financial Oversight and Management Board for Puerto Rico in public records actions. The Solicitor General's office mentioned the brief at oral argument in January 2023.

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Brendan's work at his prior firms is summarized below.

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Additional Antitrust Litigation

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Brendan ​has been involved in some of the highest-profile antitrust battles of recent years.  He was a member of the trial and appellate team that secured a complete defense victory for Qualcomm in 2020 in an action brought by the Federal Trade Commission in the Northern District of California.  Brendan and the Qualcomm team were recognized by the Daily Journal, which named the matter a "Top Appellate Reversal" in 2021.  The FTC victory for Qualcomm also received the Global Competition Review's 2021 award for Behavioural Matter of the Year – Americas.  Brendan also represented Qualcomm in two trials against Apple involving antitrust claims or defenses, including as a member of the trial team before the International Trade Commission that obtained an initial determination recommending an injunction barring the importation of iPhones found to infringe on Qualcomm patents.  Following opening statements at the second trial in 2019, Qualcomm and Apple reached a global settlement that included a payment from Apple to Qualcomm.  The Qualcomm representation against Apple was awarded the Global Competition Review's 2020 prize for Litigation of the Year – Non-Cartel Defence. 

Also in 2020, Brendan was among the counsel representing Epic Games in obtaining partial temporary and preliminary injunctive relief in an antitrust suit against Apple and defended a medical devices company in antitrust litigation in California.

Additional Securities, M&A, and Corporate Governance Litigation

Trial Litigation

• Represented Precision Castparts Corp. and its board of directors in proposed shareholder class action litigation in state court and federal court challenging its $37 billion acquisition by Berkshire Hathaway.

• Part of the team that represented a major consumer goods company in a dispute concerning purchase price adjustment claims of significant dollar amounts. 

• Assisted in representing an oil company and its board of directors in a consolidated putative shareholder class action in Delaware Chancery Court challenging its acquisition.  The transaction closed and plaintiffs voluntarily dismissed the suit.**

• Assisted in representing a major financial institution in defense of multiple residential mortgage-backed securities litigations, including in the dismissal of over $8 million in certificates.**  

Appellate Litigation

• Represented minority shareholders of closely held corporation at the cert stage in the Georgia Supreme Court.

• Assisted in the representation of civil procedure professors as amici curiae supporting securities class plaintiffs in successful defense of the fraud on the market presumption of reliance at the Supreme Court.**  ​

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​Additional Consumer, Mass Tort, and Environmental Litigation

Trial Litigation

• Among the resolution counsel for a global healthcare company in a major mass tort matter involving multiple litigations.

• Advised an agricultural company regarding potential mass tort exposure.

• Represented a technology company in litigation concerning CERCLA remediation and contribution and deposed an expert witness as a first-year associate.

Appellate Litigation

• Assisted appellate counsel representing class plaintiffs in precedent-setting appeal in the Fifth Circuit affirming a common inference of reliance in civil RICO actions alleging a pyramid scheme.**  

Corporate Bankruptcy Litigation

• Part of the team that represented a utility company in Chapter 11 proceedings.  Brendan drafted a brief on behalf of nearly all retained professionals, including opposing counsel, regarding attorney fee review procedures. 

• Part of the team that represented Allied World Assurance Company, Ltd. in its successful motion to compel arbitration of an adversary proceeding brought in New York bankruptcy court by successors to the estate of MF Global Holdings, Ltd. to recover on excess insurance policies.  

• Part of the team that represented Credit Suisse as a senior secured creditor in the Chapter 11 bankruptcy of UCI International.  Credit Suisse was repaid in full upon plan confirmation. 

• Part of the team that represented a major financial institution in a matter relating to post‑petition interest on claims arising from terminated ISDA swaps in the U.K. insolvency administration of Lehman Brothers International (Europe).

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Brendan was born in Staten Island, New York and grew up in central New Jersey.  He received his B.A. cum laude, with high honors in political science, from Boston College in 2012, where he was named a Scholar of the College and to the Order of the Cross and Crown and was a member of the college and departmental honors programs.  He also served as an immigration constituent services intern in Senator Edward M. Kennedy's Boston office.  Brendan graduated cum laude from the Georgetown University Law Center in 2015, where he was an articles editor of the Georgetown Law Journal and received the Linda C. Quinn Memorial Scholarship recognizing merit in corporate or securities law.  In his first year of law school, he received three CALI awards for best exam, including in legal research and writing. He was then a summer law clerk for the Hon. Aida M. Delgado-Colón of the U.S. District Court for the District of Puerto Rico and a judicial intern with the Hon. Reggie B. Walton of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. 

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While at Georgetown, Brendan was a research assistant to professor Alvaro Santos and a law clerk at an appellate litigation boutique.  Before launching his firm, Brendan was a litigation associate at Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP in New York.

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Brendan is admitted to practice in New York and Washington, DC.

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**Matter prior to admission under the supervision of admitted attorneys.