Hertz, who will begin her new role in November, made waves in January when she joined the White House from the Biden administration as deputy assistant to the president and secretary of personnel. She spent the months leading up to that appointment as general counsel for the Biden-Harris presidential transition team.
“I am delighted to join the Shopify team as General Counsel and honored to play a role in making entrepreneurship tools available to as many people as possible,” Hertz said in a statement posted on her LinkedIn profile. .
Hertz added that it was a “privilege” to serve the White House and Biden-Harris team.
Prior to spending the last 10 months in the public service, Hertz was associate general counsel for regulation at Facebook Inc., which the former Washington-based litigation and public policy partner of Jenner & Block joined in 2018.
The White House last week appointed Neera Tanden, a lawyer who stepped down earlier this year from an appointment to head the Office of Management and Budget, to succeed Hertz as staff secretary.
Shopify did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The Ottawa, Canada-based company, which is grappling with supply chain issues ahead of the holiday shopping season, hired Erin Zipes and Vivek Narayanadas to lead its legal group in August. These steps followed the departure of former chief legal officer Joseph Frasca, who has yet to reveal his next venture.
Zipes and Narayanadas were both VP Legal Affairs at Shopify. Narayanadas is also the data protection officer for the company, while Zipes is deputy general counsel and general secretary, according to their respective LinkedIn profiles.
Last month, Shopify saw former corporate lawyer Jodi Golinsky join digital banking startup Current as the new general counsel.
As for Hertz, she began her legal career with the Obama administration’s Justice Department and the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs.
A financial disclosure form filed by Hertz this year as part of her return to public service showed she received nearly $ 800,000 in salary and bonuses from her role at Facebook, as well as nearly $ 100,000. for serving as general counsel for PT Fund Inc., the official name of Biden’s transition team.
Hertz was also paid $ 20,000 to be a lecturer at Columbia Law School in New York, according to his file with the Office of Government Ethics.
United States Supreme Court Deputy Judge Sonia Sotomayor officiated in 2009 for the marriage of Hertz, her former clerk at the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, to Christopher Angell. Angell, a former partner at Covington & Burling, is now director of strategy and business development for water technology company Xylem Inc.
Biden’s transition team decision last year to appoint Hertz as chief legal officer, a position that required him to navigate various ethical issues and potential conflicts of interest, has drawn attention due to his stint. on Facebook, according to Politico, which first noted its recruitment by Shopify on Tuesday.
SoulCycle GC continues
The Canadian e-commerce giant, which was valued at $ 200 billion last July, is not the only company in the online retail industry to reshape its in-house legal team.
The Packable Co., a privately held e-commerce platform and owner of health and beauty retailer Pharmapacks LLC, this month recruited former SoulCycle Inc. general counsel, Maria Krasnikow Harris. , to be its first legal director.
Harris, in a post on her LinkedIn profile last week, said she was “excited to share” that she has joined the Packable team as the new chief legal officer. She did not respond to a request for comment on her departure earlier this year from SoulCycle, a spin fitness studio chain hard hit financially by the coronavirus pandemic.
Neither does Ian Cohen, who joined Pharmapacks as General Counsel in 2019.
Cooley advised Packable, the parent company of Pharmapacks, in September on its intention to go public through a merger with Highland Transcend Partners I Corp., a special purpose acquisition company based in Miami Beach, Fla. Advised by Davis Polk & Wardwell. The combined entity is expected to have a market valuation of around $ 1.6 billion.
