HiveWatch Inc., a physical security startup, has hired FisherBroyles commercial and privacy litigation partner Scott Goldsmith as its first general counsel.
Goldsmith told Bloomberg Law in an email that he advised his new employer during his time at FisherBroyles and Dorsey & Whitney, having spent nearly five years at the latter as an associate and partner in Costa Mesa, Calif.
“Working in-house allows me to better understand the day-to-day business and plan for the company’s long-term goals,” Goldsmith said.
HiveWatch specializes in sensor fusion technology, which involves the collection of data from multiple sensors. The company uses machine learning to consolidate the various feeds into a single workflow that alerts client companies to matters that require human attention.
The company in October secured $20 million in Series A financing from 01 Advisors, a venture capital firm led by Richard Costolo and Adam Bain, who respectively once served as CEO and COO for Twitter Inc.
Ryan Schonfeld, a former police officer and investigator who has been a consultant to the U.S. Department of State, is CEO of the company he founded in 2020 with $5 million in seed funding.
Joel Ferdinand, an Atlanta-based global general counsel and managing partner of litigation at FisherBroyles, confirmed Goldsmith’s Nov. 15 departure and wished him well. The law firm earlier this year cracked the ranks of the most profitable in the U.S. despite eschewing physical office space.
FisherBroyles hired Goldsmith last year from Dorsey & Whitney, where he led that firm’s Telephone Consumer Protection Act practice group.
Goldsmith said he joined HiveWatch because the startup offered him the “perfect blend” of his professional and personal interests, such as security, innovation, technology, and “helping good people help others.”
He’ll work with a team of outside counsel that includes Prospera Law, a Los Angeles-based firm formerly known as LKP Law that advised the company on its Series A financing, as well as other firms.
El Segundo, Calif.-based HiveWatch hired Goldsmith around the same time that Citizen, a neighborhood safety and crime-tracking startup, recruited its first legal chief in former Twitter lawyer Matthew Heckman.
Goldsmith previously practiced at California firms Severson & Werson and Lewis Brisbois Bisgaard & Smith after starting his legal career in 2009 as a deputy district attorney in San Diego.
https://news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/hivewatch-security-firm-backed-by-ex-twitter-ceo-hires-law-head