Rita O’Neill is a partner in Sullivan & Cromwell’s Los Angeles office and serves as Co-Head of the Firm’s Global Private Equity Group. She has a broad-based practice that includes advising clients on mergers and acquisitions and securities offerings, and providing general corporate advice on disclosure and governance. She has advised clients in a wide range of industries, including consumer and retail, financial services, healthcare and life sciences, industrials, semiconductors, telecommunications and transportation.
Professional Activities and Community Involvement
Rita is chair of the ABA M&A Committee and co-chair of the ABA Acquisition of Public Companies Subcommittee. She is the former chair of its M&A Market Trends Subcommittee and its Deal Points Study on Carveout Transactions. Rita is a member of S&C’s Women’s Initiative Committee and is the co-founder and co-chair of a national Women in M&A Network (WiMA), a network of senior women dealmakers focused on business generation. She is the immediate past co-chair of the ABA’s Women in M&A Subcommittee, which was formed to promote the recruiting, retention, and promotion of women lawyers in M&A. Rita is co-chair of the Tulane Corporate Law Institute and the Cambridge Forum on US Private Equity, and regularly participates on panels and guest teaches classes at law schools related to substantive M&A topics, as well as on gender diversity and women in the legal profession. Rita is also an active provider of pro bono legal services with a particular focus on education, foster youth and animal rights. She is a member of the Boston College Law School Dean’s Advisory Board.
