David Farrell is a lecturer in law at Santa Clara University School of Law, where he helped to develop the Online MLS in Corporate Compliance Program.

David has 20 years of experience as a vice president and chief ethics and compliance officer at Yahoo, Inc. and Sun Microsystems, Inc., where he built and led the first ethics and compliance programs for both companies. His compliance experience includes: advising executive management and the board of directors regarding business conduct and corporate compliance issues; ensuring global awareness and consistent enforcement of ethics and compliance policies; establishing training and resources to enable employees to identify, report, and resolve business conduct issues; managing global investigations; resolving conflicts of interest; and working with management to develop and coordinate global corporate compliance initiatives.

David’s professional experience also includes working in a number of other legal positions at Sun Microsystems and Hewlett-Packard. His positions at Sun Microsystems included: vice president and deputy general counsel, legal operations and corporate compliance; general counsel, microelectronics; regional counsel, east coast and canada; corporate counsel for corporate governance and securities compliance; and, sales and marketing counsel. At HP, David served as corporate counsel and supported HP’s sales and marketing operations and several major product groups.

David has been a frequent speaker at legal education and compliance programs (including Practicing Law Institute, American Conference Institute, and Compliance Week) and has served as a media spokesperson on ethics and compliance topics (including interviews in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and Compliance Week).

Prior to starting his corporate legal career, David served as a U.S. Navy lieutenant and judge advocate in Japan and San Francisco.