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John O’Brien leverages nearly two decades of experience in legal practice and senior in-house counsel roles to advise clients on legal, regulatory, compliance and enforcement matters across FDA-regulated industries, including tobacco.
Prior to joining King & Spalding, John served as Vice President and Assistant General Counsel at Reynolds, where he counseled Reynolds’ operating companies on various high-profile regulatory, marketing, and litigation matters. John focuses on advising tobacco manufacturers, wholesalers, distributors, retailers, and suppliers in all aspects of their businesses, including tobacco taxation matters, compliance with the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act and related FDA rules and guidance, administrative disputes involving federal and state governmental entities, and commercial agreements. He works with clients in all segments of the tobacco industry, including electronic nicotine delivery systems and other novel products and traditional tobacco products such as cigarettes, cigars, snus, and moist snuff. John also assists clients with FDA premarket and postmarket requirements, including substantial equivalence (SE), premarket tobacco applications (PMTA), modified risk tobacco product applications (MRTPA), and has helped companies obtain numerous FDA marketing orders for new tobacco products, including FDA’s first marketing granted order for an e-cigarette.
John frequently presents on tobacco regulatory matters at conferences, including the Food and Drug Law Institute, Next Generation Nicotine Delivery USA, American Tobacco and Nicotine Forum, and CStore Connections conferences.
In addition to his extensive tobacco regulatory experience, John spent over a decade in private practice, counseling food, supplement, and other consumer packaged goods companies on FDA, USDA, and FTC regulatory matters, including enforcement actions, civil litigation, investigations, inspections, product recalls, claims substantiation, labeling, and compliance.
Admitted only in IL and GA. Supervised by D.C. Bar Members
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