Phillip L. Durham

Phillip Durham is a partner in the Chicago and New York offices of Holland & Knight and leader of the Asset Finance Group. His practice focuses on domestic and cross-border asset-based financing, leasing, acquisitions, sales and securitizations, with a particular emphasis on global aviation and equipment finance.

Mr. Durham's client roster includes some of the biggest names in aviation and equipment finance for which he has handled billions of dollars of transactions around the globe, including numerous deal of the year award winners. Mr. Durham regularly represents these clients in connection with all manner of equipment operating leases, equipment sales and acquisitions, asset-backed financings, credit facilities and capital markets offerings, such as portfolio securitizations and asset-backed bond issuances. Mr. Durham also has significant experience in negotiating restructurings of equipment finance transactions and assisting with foreclosures, repossessions and the remarketing of aircraft, aircraft engines and aircraft spare parts in jurisdictions all over the world.

Mr. Durham has had numerous speaking engagements, from addressing the Colombian financial services industry in Bogotá (with respect of secured transaction reforms), to speaking at the Latin American Airfinance conference in Rio de Janeiro, to presenting multiple times at the Cape Town Academic Conference at Oxford University. Mr. Durham is the current Secretary General of the Mining, Agricultural and Construction Equipment Working Group and has been actively involved in the development of a 4th Protocol to the Cape Town Convention covering mining, agricultural and construction equipment. His depth and breadth of experience in aviation finance transactions in Latin America also led to him being appointed to co-direct the annual Euromoney School of Aviation Finance in Latin America. Closer to home, Mr. Durham is the former chairman of the American Bar Association's Aircraft Financing Subcommittee and a member of the Executive Committee of the Legal Advisory Panel of the Aviation Working Group.