Richard Blake: 2024 Silicon Valley 150 Corporate Governance Report
Description
(0:00 ) Intro.
(2:09 ) About the podcast sponsor: The American College of Governance Counsel.
(2:56 ) Start of interview. *Reference to prior episode with Richard (E126 from Feb 2024).
(3:46 ) About his firm's 2024 SV150 Corporate Governance Report.
(9:04 ) On Virtual (Stockholder) Meetings (89% of SV150).
(11:23 ) Board Committee Structures. Audit, Comp, NomGov, and Others.
(14:02 ) On SV150's approach to ESG, impact of new SEC.
(18:53 ) On the evolution of boardroom diversity, impact of CA laws and Nasdaq Diversity Rule.
(21:40 ) Why private ordering will become more important in corporate governance.
(22:28 ) On dual or multi class share structures (-30% of SV150, and of those, 91% have sunset provisions).
(25:25 ) On ServiceTitan's compounding IPO ratchet (reference to my article about it). "Governance is a spectrum"
(31:29 ) On evolution of shareholder proposals in SV150. *Reference to E15 with Jim McRitchie.
(36:30 ) On shareholder activism (7.4%) in SV150.
(41:41 ) On the clawback policies of SV150 companies
(48:27 ) On the backlash to Delaware incorporations and SV moving out of CA. Reference to WSGR's DE's Status as the Favored Corporate Home.
(51:49 ) Biggest winner in business in 2024
(53:27 ) Biggest loser in business in 2024
(54:27 ) Biggest business surprise in 2024
(56:53 ) Best and worst corporate governance trend from 2024
(58:28 ) What’s the biggest corporate governance trend to watch out for in 2025
Richard Blake is a partner at Wilson Sonsini and the leader of the firm's public companies’ practice.
You can follow Evan on social media at:
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Music/Soundtrack (found via Free Music Archive): Seeing The Future by Dexter Britain is licensed under a Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License
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