The Delaware Supreme Court issued a landmark ruling March 3 that state law does not excuse a Dole directors and officers insurer from covering the food company's settlements of fraud-based claims, a decision that will aid other Delaware corporations in similar disputes with their D&O carriers.
In this week's Taxation With Representation, cloud company Okta buys identity authentication company Auth0 for $6.5 billion, Las Vegas Sands sells property holdings for $6.3 billion, and insurance technology company Hippo inks a $5 billion merger.
Industrial-focused private equity firm KPS said Friday it's buying the aluminum rolling business of aluminum and energy multinational Norsk Hydro ASA for €1.38 billion (about $1.64 billion) in a deal guided by three law firms.
With so much mergers and acquisitions news this week, you may have missed several deals announced in the last several days helmed by firms such as Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP and Latham & Watkins LLP. Here, Law360 recaps the ones you may have missed.
It took 15 months, $640 million and a two-week trial but Evonik managed to close its purchase of fellow hydrogen peroxide producer PeroxyChem last year, days after its Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer LLP legal team broke the Federal Trade Commission's seven-case winning streak contesting mergers in federal court.
The past week in London has seen Scotland's ferry services sue its insurer, Britain's new high-speed rail service face another contract challenge and an ex-Qatari prime minister's company hit with a new suit. Here, Law360 looks at those and other new claims in the U.K.
Private equity firms I Squared Capital and TDR Capital will shell out £2.3 billion ($3.2 billion) for U.K.-based Aggreko, a mobile power provider on tap for the Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics, in a deal announced Friday that was built by law firms Kirkland & Ellis, Slaughter and May and Dickson Minto.
Financial technology company Square said Thursday it will take a majority stake in TIDAL, a music and entertainment company that counts artist Jay-Z among its directors, in a $297 million deal guided by Gibson Dunn, Reed Smith and Cummings & Lockwood.
Robinhood is expected to file for an IPO that could value the online trading app at $20 billion, Indian e-commerce giant Flipkart is considering a SPAC merger, and Permira has offered to buy a $3.7 billion medical device maker. Here, Law360 breaks down these and other deal rumors from the past week that you need to be aware of.
The Federal Circuit on Thursday vacated an injunction against L'Oreal's hair care products at the center of a $50 million patent case brought by Olaplex, faulting a lower court's "inappropriate" summary judgment ruling given the genuine questions of material fact regarding infringement.
Amgen said Thursday it has reached a $1.9 billion deal to buy clinical-stage pharmaceutical group Five Prime Therapeutics and its leading gastric cancer drug candidate in an acquisition guided by Sullivan & Cromwell and Cooley.
Gibson Dunn & Crutcher LLP's New York City-based partner Barbara Becker will take the multinational law firm's reins as the first woman to reach its co-terminous chair and managing partner positions in its 131-year history, the firm has announced.
Real estate analytics company CoreLogic rejected a sweetened $7.3 billion takeover offer from peer CoStar Group Thursday, citing the latter company's volatile stock price and regulatory uncertainty for the tie-up, in contrast to its pending $6 billion deal with Stone Point Capital LLC and Insight Partners.
Faegre Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP has scored a heavyweight employment attorney to co-lead its international employment law team in New York, the firm announced Wednesday.
Insurance technology company Hippo, guided by Latham & Watkins, has agreed to merge with a Sullivan & Cromwell-advised special purpose acquisition company that is led by the co-founder of LinkedIn at an enterprise value of $5 billion, the companies said Thursday.
Latham & Watkins LLP-guided Okta, which provides cloud-based tools to help businesses manage employee access to software and devices, announced Wednesday a definitive agreement to buy Perkins Coie LLP-guided Auth0 for $6.5 billion.
Delaware's high court affirmed Wednesday that RSUI Indemnity Co. owes more than $12 million toward $222 million in settlements that Dole Food Co. and its CEO struck to resolve stockholder suits over alleged fraud in a 2013 take-private deal, clarifying that state law permits coverage for claims of fraudulent conduct.
A blank-check company sponsored by former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick started trading Wednesday after raising $300 million in an Ellenoff Grossman-led initial public offering.
New York City's Hospital for Special Surgery urged a New Jersey federal court to quash a subpoena it received over a New Jersey health system antitrust row it's not involved in, arguing it shouldn't be forced to share its records because it doesn't compete with the companies involved.
Boston Scientific will pay $1.07 billion to buy the global surgical business of Israeli medical device company Lumenis, the companies said Wednesday, in a deal developed with help from Latham & Watkins and Ropes & Gray.
Only days after a pair of Georgia hospital systems called off their merger, the Federal Trade Commission revealed Wednesday that staffers had recommended challenging the tie-up.
The U.S. Department of Justice said Wednesday it has reached an agreement resolving its challenge of Geisinger Health's partial acquisition of Evangelical Community Hospital with a cap on Geisinger's ownership stake in the Pennsylvania provider and other restrictions.
The United Kingdom is trying to make it easier for companies to identify whether the merger they're mulling will trigger the country's planned mandatory notification law, which will require the government to be informed when a combination poses a national security risk.
Two shareholders have accused former EQT Corp. executives of vastly exaggerating the anticipated cost reductions and operating efficiencies of a $6.7 billion acquisition of Rice Energy in a derivative suit filed in Pennsylvania state court.
Weil Gotshal & Manges LLP has brought on a Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom LLP partner who's experienced in advising publicly traded real estate investment trusts on real estate-related transactions to the firm's tax practice in New York.
Attorneys working remotely from jurisdictions in which they are not admitted should take precautionary steps to avoid engaging in unauthorized practice of law, say John Schmidt and Michael Seaman at Phillips Lytle.
Opinion
In-court M&A challenges that benefit plaintiffs counsel more than shareholders continue unabated, demonstrating the need for federal securities law reform to prevent what amounts to a deal tax on companies forced to pay mootness fee settlements and higher directors and officers insurance premiums, say attorneys at Seyfarth.
Parenting during the pandemic has introduced a series of competing personal and professional obligations for attorneys and professional staff, and even organizations that are supportive of their parent employees can take steps to do better, says Meredith Kahan at Saul Ewing.
Deal makers have recently been focused on drafting material adverse change clauses in M&A agreements to allocate COVID-19 and other similar risks between parties in future transactions, but MACs also deserve careful consideration as backward-looking tools that represent limitations on sellers' disclosure obligations, says Phillip Cushing at Bartlit Beck.
The three degrees of state marijuana legalization regimes throughout the U.S. show that cannabis is only fully illegal in three U.S. states and one territory — not 14 states as some counts indicate — and even in those places, there are stirrings of change, says Julie Werner-Simon at Drexel University's Thomas R. Kline School of Law.
The prospect of joining a law firm during the pandemic can cause added pressure, but with a few good practices — and a little help from their firms and supervising attorneys — lawyer trainees can get ahead of the curve while working remotely, say William Morris and Ted Landray at King & Spalding.
Multinational companies should take a pragmatic approach to Foreign Corrupt Practices Act compliance by being aware of key risk areas — such as inappropriate gift-giving, liability for third-party actions, and countries with recurring corruption issues — and implementing custom-designed procedures that evolve with their operations, says Howard Weissman at Miller Canfield.
Attorneys at Nossaman look at how President Joe Biden’s ethics pledge goes beyond those of his predecessors by imposing post-employment shadow lobbying and golden parachute restrictions on his administration’s appointees — and how a House bill proposing expansion of federal ethics law could affect enforcement.
Opinion
Law graduates across the states are sitting for the grueling two-day bar exam this week despite menstruation-related barriers, such as inadequate menstrual product and bathroom access, which could be eradicated with simple policy tweaks, say law professors Elizabeth Cooper, Margaret Johnson and Marcy Karin.
Consultants at Deloitte discuss the tax implications of India's latest budget proposals, including the potential benefits for foreign portfolio investors and offshore funds migrating to India's new international financial services center, and the possible rise of M&A costs.
As transaction disputes rise amid evolving market conditions, certain strategies can help companies mitigate risk while remaining live to M&A opportunities, say attorneys at Freshfields.
The volume and diversity of data managed by law firms today — from client files to internal financial records — may seem daunting, but when properly organized, good data can help practitioners stay competitive by providing sharper insight into firm resources and cost of work, say Jaron Luttich and Barry Wiggins at Element Standard.
Whether a law firm dissolution is amicable or adversarial, departing attorneys should take steps to maintain their legal and ethical responsibilities toward clients, and beware client confidentiality pitfalls when joining new firms, say John Schmidt and Colin Fitzgerald at Phillips Lytle.
Courts are leading the way in ensuring oral argument opportunities for newer attorneys by incorporating innovative language in a variety of orders, and private parties can and should follow suit by incorporating similar language into case management orders, say Megan Jones and Halli Spraggins at Hausfeld.
Amid economic uncertainty and increasing pressure on corporate legal departments to do more with less, work management processes should be aimed at tracking legal teams' every contribution, including routine matters that can be reallocated to nonlegal staff, says Aaron Pierce at LexisNexis CounselLink.