Business Description
Ms. Witten serves as the Managing Partner of Hudson Martin PC. She has been practicing law since 1998 and is licensed in both Pennsylvania and California. With over 20 years of sophisticated transactional law experience, including business law and estate planning, Ms. Witten represents companies in business and corporate law matters and transactions, including securities transactions and issuances; Intellectual property (IP) licensing, management, and use; mergers and acquisitions (M&A); entity counseling and formations; and trademark and copyright matters. She also represents individuals in estate planning and wealth management matters.Ms. Witten has been successful in helping clients reach financing goals for their businesses – both institutional and private placement financing. In 2014, she represented the seller in a $38.5M acquisition by a public entity. In 2017, another client who Ms. Witten represented through four changes in ownership, sold for $86M. She routinely handles private placements and works with national and local institutional investors and lenders on deals ranging in size.
Ms. Witten has been the Managing Partner of Hudson Martin PC since 2013 when her firm merged in with one of the most historic firms in California history. Under Ms. Witten’s leadership, this historic firm has connected with the next generation of entrepreneurs and leaders and is now one of Monterey County’s most economically vibrant firms.
In 2007, Ms. Witten launched her own firm and since that time has conferred and joined with other firms in the area that have helped form Hudson Martin what it is today. In the spring of 2011, Ms. Witten created and launched what is now the number one wine law blog in the country: www.winelawdecanted.com. The firm represents a number of wineries and numerous clients who own and operate with liquor licenses.
Prior to her time in private practice, Ms. Witten served as General Counsel, Chief Compliance Officer, and Corporate Secretary to an SEC-registered investment advisor with over $1.6 Billion in AUM (2005 – 2007). She managed all of the company’s legal matters, its Securities Exchange Act reporting, and related SEC-driven compliance issues. Ms. Witten served as a trustee of the company’s retirement plan. In addition to her corporate legal and compliance responsibilities, she was available as a resource to the company’s private client group in complex wealth management issues.
From 2003 to 2005, Ms. Witten served as Corporate Counsel of WVHTC Foundation, a national government contracting company working with federally funded technology-based projects, including programs for the Department of Justice (DOJ), Navy, and NASA. She was an active member of the management team and acted as Counsel for its subsidiary, BioPharmance, Inc., a biotechnology company concentrated in proteomics cancer research & development (R&D). Ms. Witten managed all corporate legal matters for BioPharmance, including Employment Law, securities reporting and compliance, international contracting, private placement funding, and issuance of debt and equity securities. One of the most rewarding legal projects that Ms. Witten assisted with during her tenure was the launch of the AmberView technology, funded by the DOJ to support the national AmberAlert system by providing timely 3-D images of abducted children to law enforcement. Ms. Witten also served as legal counsel to Criterion Independent Labs, which evaluates technology against the IT Security Evaluation standard to validate vendor security claims in order to make the technology eligible for U.S. government employment. Ms. Witten was legal counsel to Intellectual Property Management Group and The Public Safety and Homeland Security Group. Both groups conduct evaluations of IP for organizations such as the Environmental Protection Agency and law enforcement agencies and assist in the advancement the IP through commercialization. Another rewarding experience was Ms. Witten’s legal work with the team at INNOVA, a seed, and early-stage investment capital group, where Ms. Witten was responsible for drafting all investment documents including debt and equity security-related transaction documents.
Prior to her in-house corporate experience, Ms. Witten worked as an associate attorney for Jackson Kelly PLLC, where she assisted with the growth of the firm’s emerging business and technology practice and worked with clients on numerous types business and corporate law matters, including Business and technology alliances; Corporate governance; Government contracting; Trademark and copyright law, IP licensing, management and use; M&A; Entity counseling and formation, and Issuances of debt and equity securities. Ms. Witten was also involved in the legal aspects of the launch of the Global Grid Exchange, which at the time, was the largest grid computing network in the nation.
While her career path has led her into corporate and business law, Ms. Witten remains very active in the public interest sector and uses her skills to help benefit and promote several charitable organizations. Her pro bono community involvement is summarized on Hudson Martin’s Community page.
Ms. Witten is an avid hiker and runner, having completed five marathons to date, including four Big Sur International Marathons. She is an active mom of twins and volunteers with and serves on the Pacific Repertory Theatre board. The family including Snowflake the mini poodle, and Pumpkin Pi Princess the kitty, live in Carmel, California.
Awards
Best Attorney – Monterey County Weekly (2024)
Best Estate Planning Attorney – Carmel Pine Cone (2024)
Best Attorney if You Need to Sue Someone – Carmel Pine Cone (2024)
