Timothy A. Miller

Tim Miller founded the Silicon Valley office of Valle Makoff after 14 years as a litigation partner in the Northern California offices of the international law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP. Mr. Miller has extensive experience litigating complex cases in federal and state courts.

Mr. Miller’s practice includes a broad range of business and contract disputes, claims of trade secret misappropriation, claims against officers, directors and trustees asserting breach of fiduciary duty, claims of unfair business practices and unfair competition, business tort litigation, corporate and securities litigation, litigation arising from mergers and acquisitions and shareholder derivative litigation. He also represented special committees and individual members of Boards of Directors in connection with internal corporate and SEC investigations.

Since joining Valle Makoff, Mr. Miller has handled a variety of “business divorce” and other commercial and shareholder disputes, including the representation of:

• a co-founder and minority shareholder of a high tech startup in a dispute with his co-founder and various venture capital funds related to the recapitalization of the company;
• a majority member of a California LLC in a dispute with the minority members regarding his management of the company;
• a minority member of a closely-held California LLC engaged in real estate investment in a dispute with her partners under various operating agreements;
• a 50% shareholder of a closely-held family held business in shareholder disputes with the other shareholders and family members regarding the management and sale of the business;
• JD.com (the Amazon.com of China) in a dispute with Amazon regarding JD.com’s hiring of a former Amazon engineer;
• HP Inc. in confidential commercial disputes;
• a government sub-contractor in connection with breach of contract claims asserted by the prime contractor on a major, high profile contract with the Department of Energy;
• a manufacturer of innovative plumbing solutions in connection with its claims for millions of dollars of indemnification against the former owners of the business under an asset purchase agreement;
• a technology startup in connection with a dispute regarding the client’s acquisition of a business, resulting in a full rescission of the sale following Mr. Miller’s internal investigation;
• the former President and Chief Operating Officer of a retail chain in a dispute with the private equity owners of the company.

While at Skadden, Mr. Miller’s representations included:

• The National Football League in connection with a class action filed by retired players alleging that the players suffer from injuries and addictions resulting from the alleged improper administration of prescription drugs and painkillers during their playing days;
• The current and former independent directors of Hewlett-Packard Co. in connection with shareholder derivative and class actions arising from HP’s $11.1 billion acquisition of Autonomy Corporation;
• Computer Sciences Corporation and certain former officers in consolidated shareholder federal class action litigation in the Eastern District of Virginia, arising in part from CSC’s contract with the United Kingdom’s National Health Service (acting through Connecting for Health) to establish a centralized patient record system in the United Kingdom;
• The former CEO of a publicly traded REIT in connection with claims of trade secret misappropriation by his former employer and to recover millions of dollars in severance withheld by the company he founded;
• A private equity fund asserting claims of fraud, breach of contract and indemnification against another private equity fund in connection with the sale of a portfolio company;
• A Japanese conglomerate in a dispute with its collaboration partner regarding the development of a new siRNA drug;
• The acquirer of Peet’s Coffee & Tea in connection with shareholder litigation seeking to enjoin a $1 billion merger transaction;
• NRG Energy Inc. in an original proceeding brought in the California Court of Appeal by a competitor in the electronic vehicle charging market challenging a settlement between NRG and the California Public Utilities Commission pursuant to which NRG would invest $100 million in California’s EV charging infrastructure;
• The investment banking division of UBS in connection with claims brought in California state court by private investors in Solidus Networks Inc. dba Pay By Touch;
• A special committee of the KLA-Tencor board of directors in connection with an investigation of past stock option granting practices, and the special litigation committee of the KLA board in connection with related shareholder derivative litigation;
• McKesson Corporation in connection with state and federal shareholder litigation arising from its 1999 restatement, including consolidated federal shareholder class action litigation, federal ERISA class action litigation and individual shareholder actions in multiple federal and state courts;
• The CEO of a company involved in the computerized algorithmic trading of securities in connection with claims of theft and trade secret misappropriation;
• A major investment bank in defense of a trade secret litigation arising from a contest for corporate control involving one of its clients; and
• Golden Eagle Insurance Co. in connection with the seizure by the California Department of Insurance of more than $2 billion in assets and the related insurance insolvency proceedings in the San Francisco Superior Court.

Mr. Miller has been selected repeatedly for inclusion in The U.S. News & World Report’s Best Lawyers in America for commercial litigation and is listed as a Super Lawyer in Business Litigation for 2018. He writes and speaks frequently on legal and business issues critical to public and private companies.

Mr. Miller received his Juris Doctor degree from the Boalt Hall School of Law (now UC Berkeley Law) in 1991. He graduated Order of Coif and served as an Associate Editor on the California Law Review. Mr. Miller graduated summa cum laude from Whitworth College in 1988 with a B.A. in Philosophy, where upon graduation he was awarded the President’s Cup, Whitworth’s highest academic honor. He is admitted to the California Bar.