Burke Hopkins, Lavonne

Lavonne Burke Hopkins currently serves as Senior Legal Director, Cybersecurity, Product & Application Security and Dell Digital (IT) for Dell Technologies, Inc.  In this role, Lavonne is responsible for providing key legal support to Dell’s Chief Information Security Officer and global cybersecurity and IT organizations.  Her responsibilities also include providing legal support of Dell’s Product and Application Security organization, Product Security Incident Response Team and Vulnerability Management program. Lavonne additionally provides legal support to Dell’s Security and Resiliency Organization’s Governance, Risk and Compliance office, as well as several of Dell’s Business Unit Security Offices.

Prior to joining Dell, Lavonne worked for Johnson & Johnson where she served as Senior Director for Global Technology Transactions, Cybersecurity and Privacy Contracting.  In this role she oversaw the negotiations of more than $3B annually in software and IT transactions, provided guidance on new technology acquisitions and directly supported J&J’s global Information Technology organization.  As part of her duties, she also served as J&J’s Chief Cybersecurity counsel, where she designed and managed the organization’s privacy and cybersecurity contracting process to ensure world-wide compliance with international data protection laws.  Prior to Johnson & Johnson, Lavonne worked for Vinson & Elkins, LLP for several years where she helped launch the firm’s Cybersecurity and Data Privacy practice and counseled clients on intellectual property and technology transactions matters. At V&E, her practice also focused on advising companies of all sizes on the negotiation of intellectual property and software licenses, protection of IP rights, IP monetization, technology/IP acquisitions, venture capital and private equity investments and IPOs. In addition, Lavonne has extensive experience assisting clients in the creation, development and implementation of global privacy, data protection and cybersecurity governance and compliance frameworks and in managing incident responses of all sizes. 

Lavonne is an avid speaker and author in the areas of cybersecurity and incident response, privacy, software development and licensing, IP monetization and technology transactions.  She  has repeatedly been named a top attorney in Houston, as well as a Rising Star in Intellectual Property.  Lavonne currently serves as a member of the State Bar of Texas Computer and Technology Section Council, is a member of the Texas Bar College and a Fellow of the Texas Bar Foundation. Throughout her career, Lavonne has served as a diversity and inclusion advocate for the State Bar of Texas and the Houston Bar Association, where she served for many years as a member and co-chair of the Minority Opportunities in the Legal Profession Community.  She is also the former Executive Director of The Downtown Group – the African-American/Black women’s bar association for Houston, TX.  In her current role at Dell Technologies, Lavonne has continued her commitment to Diversity & Inclusion efforts as an active participant in numerous company-wide Diversity & Inclusion initiatives.  Lavonne is a graduate of The Univ. of Houston Law Center and obtained her undergraduate degree in chemical engineering from Howard University and her Master of Science in biomedical engineering from The Johns Hopkins University.