Erin Estevez

Erin Estevez is a partner in Holland & Knight's Corporate, M&A and Securities and Government Contracts practice groups in the firm's Tysons office. Ms. Estevez has broad government contracts (GovCon) experience and focuses her practice on advising companies ranging from innovative startups to large, established contractors on regulatory and contractual requirements for doing business with the U.S. government.

Ms. Estevez has substantial experience with mergers and acquisitions and financings involving government contractors, including conducting due diligence, negotiating transactional documents, and assessing industrial security and foreign ownership, control and influence (FOCI) issues, as well as navigating post-transaction matters such as novations. She also regularly advises clients on compliance with the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) and agency FAR supplements, intellectual property and data rights, small business programs, cybersecurity requirements, obtaining facility security clearances and FOCI mitigation, and Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests and responses. In addition, Ms. Estevez negotiates the terms of government contracts, subcontracts and teaming agreements.

Representative government contracts transactions matters include:

• represented a federal sector IT solutions and services provider in acquisition by private equity-backed management consulting firm
• represented a strategic advisory company specializing in federal opportunities in connection with significant growth capital investment from a knowledge and talent industries investment firm
• represented an investment firm focused on technology and government services in a majority investment into federal digital transformation services firm
• represented a provider of IT modernization and digital transformation solutions for U.S. federal agencies in a stock sale to a global consulting and digital services company
• represented a venture-capital-backed intelligence community services company in acquisition of cyber technology solutions company supporting defense, intelligence and national security missions
• represented a software solutions company performing data analytics for mission-critical information in major capital investment from a global investment firm, including negotiation of FOCI mitigation
• represented an augmented intelligence platform company in late-stage financing and concurrent acquisition of a machine learning and management solutions provider

Ms. Estevez also has handled sensitive internal investigations, responses to government and regulatory inquiries regarding corporate compliance issues, mandatory disclosures and False Claims Act (FCA) litigation. Her litigation experience spans a variety of cases in state, federal district and appellate courts across the country, bid protests before the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) and the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, and FOIA litigation, as well as alternative dispute resolution proceedings. She has substantial experience in all major stages of litigation, from pretrial through appeal. Ms. Estevez also assists companies and individuals in responding to requests for information, documents and testimony through Civil Investigative Demands (CIDs) and Office of the Inspector General (OIG) subpoenas, as well as civil and grand jury subpoenas.

In addition, Ms. Estevez regularly dedicates time to pro bono matters. Among other cases, she co-chaired representation of an individual criminally prosecuted for fraud, conspiracy and conversion in relation to a U.S. Department of State grant in the Eastern District of Virginia, helped an animal rights group navigate the requirements of the Competition in Contracting Act (CICA) with the U.S. Department of Agriculture and assisted a conditional permanent resident with a Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) petition.

Prior to joining Holland & Knight, Ms. Estevez was a special counsel for a global law firm in its Washington, D.C., office. While at George Mason University School of Law, Ms. Estevez was chief justice and first-year competition chair of the Moot Court Board, a published author and an editor for the George Mason Law Review, and treasurer of the George Mason American Inn of Court. She was recognized upon graduation as the ALI-ABA Scholarship and Leadership Award recipient for her graduating class.