Corporate governance practices vary significantly among public companies. This is a reflection of many factors, including:

• Differences in the stage of development of companies, including the relative importance placed on various values (for example, focus on growth and scaling operations may be given more importance);

• Differences in the investor base for different types of companies;

• Differences in expectations of board members and advisors to companies and their boards, which can vary by size, age of company, stage of development, geography, industry and other factors; and

• The reality that corporate governance practices that are appropriate for large, long-established public companies can be meaningfully different from those for newer, smaller companies. Since the passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, which signaled the initial wave of corporate governance reforms among public companies, Fenwick has surveyed the corporate governance practices of the companies included in the Standard & Poor’s 100 Index (S&P 100) and the technology and life sciences companies included in the Fenwick – Bloomberg Law Silicon Valley 150 List (SV 150) each year...