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Meet your new Law Firm

McMillan is a leading Canadian business law firm serving private, public and not-for-profit clients across key industries in Canada, the United States and around the world. With recognized expertise and acknowledged leadership in major business sectors, we provide solutions-oriented legal advice through our offices in Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto, Ottawa, Montréal and Hong Kong. Our firm values – respect, teamwork, commitment, client service and professional excellence – are at the heart of McMillan’s commitment to serve our clients, our local communities and the legal profession.

Our industry-focused teams follow industry developments and participate in industry associations and events, enabling us to deliver sound practical legal advice informed by knowledge of our clients and their industries. We have teams concentrating on the Cannabis, energy, oil and gas, media and entertainment, automotive, health care and transportation sectors, to name just a few.

The Startups @ McMillan team leverages this deep industry knowledge and experience while providing streamlined, efficient legal services to startups.

Did you know? Our industry-focused teams follow industry developments and participate in industry associations and events

Meet the Team

We’re entrepreneurs. Founders. Explorers. Web developers. We educate. We’re gamers. Avid skiers. We’re into theatre. We innovate. We’re into science fiction. We travel. We're here to help you. Come meet the team.

• Robert Piasentin
  Partner, Technology and Business Law — Vancouver [email protected] 1-604-893-7636

Robert is a partner with McMillan based out of the firm’s Vancouver office. He is the leader of the Startups and Emerging Companies initiative, leads the firm’s Technology Law practice, and is a member of McMillan’s Business Law Group and Technology, Intellectual Property and Privacy Group.

Robert spent a number of years working as an in-house lawyer, with more than a decade spent as the General Counsel with a Vancouver-based technology company and working with the largely startup based technology community on the West Coast.   As a result, he has developed a keen understanding of the needs, challenges and opportunities facing startups and emerging companies as they look to establish their position in the market.

Robert really enjoys collaborating with the management and executive teams behind startup and emerging companies as they confront and overcome all of the obstacles that they face on the road to becoming a global market force.  He works hard to create strong and trusted relationships with all of his clients and wants to be the first person you call with any questions related to your business.

Robert also makes a point of getting involved in community initiatives and organizations to give back to those communities.  He is the Board Chair of the Alzheimer Society of BC, sits on the Boards of the Alzheimer Society of Canada and the Alzheimer’s Research Foundation of BC, he is also a founding member of both the Association of Corporate Counsel – BC Chapter and the St. Thomas More Catholic Lawyers Guild of British Columbia, and is on the Board and acts as the Secretary of the Red Resort Association.  In his spare time, Robert can often be found coaching his son’s baseball team (where he was lucky enough to be a coach of the 2019 Coquitlam Little League Majors All Stars Team who won the national championships and went all the way to the Little League World Series as Team Canada) or watching his daughters’ basketball games.

• Leila Rafi
  Partner, Capital Markets & Securities and M&A — Toronto [email protected] 1-416-945-8017

Unlike a typical Bay Street lawyer, Leila is an extrovert and highly social who most enjoys connecting contacts for business ideas and deals through her extensive professional network. As the leader of the Startups and Emerging Companies, and Partner in the Capital Markets and M&A Group, Leila brings boundless energy in working with founders and entrepreneurs, guiding them through the legal landscape and helping them avoid common pitfalls for startups.

Previously, she developed her corporate and commercial expertise acting as co-lead external counsel on the Modernization Project for the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation for four years, but worry not, she won’t tell you not to take a gamble on your latest idea or product!

Leila has also acted as an adjunct professor at the Universities of Windsor and Western law schools, and leads annual course programs for legal professionals.

When she’s not helping her clients raise capital or nurture their latest invention, Leila is a champion for diversity and inclusion in corporate leadership, speaks regularly on a variety of securities law topics, and volunteers for the Law Society and Yonge Street Mission.

• Pablo Tseng Partner, Intellectual Property and Business Law — Vancouver [email protected] 1-778-328-1631

Pablo is a lawyer, patent agent, and trademark agent. But don’t let that fool you: he is indeed someone that you’ll enjoy talking to – both about law and topics not related to law.

Pablo’s intellectual property law practice is varied, and he keeps it that way in order to be better in tune with the business realities that his clients face. In addition to drafting commercial and licensing agreements and handling all aspects of patent and trademark drafting, prosecution, and enforcement, he also prides himself in helping you assess what your IP needs really are at any given time during the life cycle of your business. He is, at heart, an IP advisor.

Outside of his legal practice, you will find Pablo constantly trying to make comebacks in past-times he enjoyed prior to getting into the legal profession. One day he will succeed, and earn the coveted title of being “comeback weekend warrior of the year”.

• Kourtney Rylands Senior Associate, Business Law and Restructuring & Insolvency — Calgary [email protected] 1-403-355-3326

Kourtney is a business law and restructuring lawyer who has experience dealing with companies at all stages of development. She assists clients to deal with companies that are in distress in her restructuring practice and takes that perspective to her corporate practice and her work with start-up companies.

She focuses on providing timely and practical advice to her clients and believes in tailoring legal advice and legal work to the current needs of a company. In addition, she takes a team approach to client service which allows clients to benefit from cost savings and efficiencies in service, which are key for growing companies.

Kourtney has dealt with hundreds of start-up and junior businesses in a broad range of industries, including applied technologies, life sciences, manufacturing, energy, agriculture, and retail. This experience allows Kourtney to understand the issues that can prevent a company from succeeding and gives her a unique perspective on establishing and structuring start-ups.