For mergers and acquisitions attorneys, 2025 is shaping up to be the year when AI becomes a business imperative across industries, turning the dealmaking landscape into a high-stakes chess match of technological innovation.
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TOP NEWS

Analysis

AI's Growing Influence On M&A Creates A High-Stakes Game

By Al Barbarino

For mergers and acquisitions attorneys, 2025 is shaping up to be the year when AI becomes a business imperative across industries, turning the dealmaking landscape into a high-stakes chess match of technological innovation.

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Paul Weiss, Fenwick Build Rocket's $1.75B Redfin Buy

By Jade Martinez-Pogue

Detroit-based real estate-focused fintech platform Rocket Cos., advised by Paul Weiss Rifkind Wharton & Garrison LLP, on Monday announced that it has agreed to buy Fenwick & West LLP-led digital real estate brokerage Redfin in a $1.75 billion all-stock deal.

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ServiceNow Makes AI Push With $2.85B Moveworks Buy

By Al Barbarino

Santa Clara, California-based software company ServiceNow said Monday it has agreed to acquire Moveworks for $2.85 billion, in a move that ServiceNow said will expand its existing artificial intelligence offerings to include more automated options for front-end employees. 

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Whitecap Merging With Veren In $10.4B Oil & Gas Deal

By Al Barbarino

Whitecap Resources Inc. said Monday it will merge with fellow Canadian oil and gas company Veren Inc. in an all-stock deal valued at CA$15 billion (US$10.4 billion) including debt. 

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Kirkland-Led BWGI Offer Values French Glass Co. At €6.1B

By Dawood Fakhir

Asset manager BWGI said Monday it is making an offer for the shares of Verallia it doesn't already own, giving the French glass packaging maker an enterprise value of €6.1 billion ($6.6 billion), in a deal guided by Bredin Prat and Kirkland.

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Assura Tentatively Accepts KKR's Sweetened £1.6B Bid

By Najiyya Budaly

The board of property manager Assura said Monday that it is willing to back an improved £1.6 billion ($2.1 billion) proposed takeover offer from two U.S. private equity firms, batting away a rival bid by a U.K. real estate investment trust.

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Ski Resort Buy Deemed Illegal In Precedential NY AG Win

By Bryan Koenig

New York's attorney general celebrated a precedent-setting antitrust win Monday, faulting a ski mountain operator for buying a rival just to shut it down.

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DELAWARE

Del. Bar Panel OKs Corp. Law Bill To Curb Class Suits, Fees

By Jeff Montgomery

A key panel of the Delaware's State Bar Association overwhelmingly approved on Monday a pending bill to put new constraints on corporate stockholder lawsuits, over objections that the measure will snuff out shareholder protections from conflicted boards and corporation controllers.

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MERGER REVIEW

Early Signs Point To 'Vigorous' Trump Antitrust Regime

By Al Barbarino

Early signals from the Trump administration suggest a continued "vigorous" approach to merger enforcement, despite expectations of a more business-friendly environment, panelists said Friday at the annual Tulane Corporate Law Institute.

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DEALS

Travers Smith-Led DBAY Ups Alliance Pharma Bid To £362M

By Dawood Fakhir

Asset manager DBAY Advisors said Monday that a bidding company it formed in partnership with a European private equity fund has agreed to increase its offer for British consumer healthcare company Alliance Pharma to approximately £362 million ($468 million).

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CAPITAL MARKETS

Fintech-Focused SPAC Titan Acquisition Files $240M IPO

By Jade Martinez-Pogue

Special purpose acquisition company Titan Acquisition Corp. on Monday detailed plans to raise up to $240 million in its initial public offering, with the goal of merging with a company in the finance and tech-enabled services industries.

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LITIGATION

Alsup Refuses To Vacate Hearing Into OPM Mass Firings

By Dorothy Atkins

U.S. District Judge William Alsup on Monday denied the Trump administration's request to vacate an upcoming evidentiary hearing into the U.S. Office of Personnel Management's mass firings of probationary federal employees, and required OPM director Charles Ezell to appear in person or else be deposed.

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Ill. Judge Floats Sanctions In Akorn Mootness Fee Fight

By Lauraann Wood

An Illinois federal judge signaled Tuesday he is open to sanctions including a mandatory violation disclosure against plaintiffs' counsel as he continues navigating a challenge to so-called mootness fees paid to settle and dismiss allegedly baseless Akorn Inc. merger disclosure suits. 

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DOJ Accuses Live Nation Of 'Delay Tactics' In Antitrust Suit

By David Minsky

U.S. Department of Justice officials have urged a New York federal judge to issue an order compelling Live Nation Entertainment Inc. to produce documents held by several executives, accusing the company of using "delay tactics" in the lawsuit alleging anticompetitive behavior since merging with Ticketmaster Entertainment LLC in 2010.

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PEOPLE

Paul Hastings Adds Kirkland Atty As Global M&A Co-Chair

By Tracey Read

Paul Hastings LLP has hired a third global co-chair for its mergers and acquisitions practice who was one of the youngest M&A partners in the world to have announced well over $1 trillion in deals, the firm said Monday.

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Davis Polk Adds Debevoise M&A Co-Leader In Calif.

By Rose Krebs

Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP announced Monday the firm bolstered its mergers and acquisitions practice by hiring an attorney who most recently co-chaired the M&A group at Debevoise & Plimpton LLP.

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EXPERT ANALYSIS

Opinion

Antitrust Analysis In Iowa Pathologist Case Misses The Mark

An Iowa federal court erred in its recent decision in Goldfinch Laboratory v. Iowa Pathology Associates by focusing exclusively on market impacts and sidestepping key questions that should be central to antitrust standing analysis, says Daniel Graulich at Baker McKenzie.

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LEGAL INDUSTRY

National Lawyers Guild Slams Trump's Perkins Coie Order

By Rachel Riley

The Seattle Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild denounced President Donald Trump's recent executive order revoking Perkins Coie LLP's security clearances, saying on Monday the decision "exemplifies his complete disregard for the rule of law and his contempt for core American democratic values."

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GOP Sens. Escalate Fight With ABA Over 'Leftist' Statements

By Courtney Bublé

A group of Senate Republicans are once again going after the American Bar Association, which they claim has become a "leftist" organization, and announced Monday they will disregard ABA ratings on judicial nominees and encouraged the Trump administration and their colleagues to do the same.

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Paul Hastings Reelects Chair, Managing Partner To 2nd Terms

By Tracey Read

Paul Hastings LLP Chair Frank Lopez and Managing Partner Sherrese Smith have been reelected to their second three-year terms, the firm said Monday.

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Judge Who Shot Wife Gets Mistrial As Jury Hangs On Murder

By Gina Kim

A California judge declared a mistrial Monday in the murder trial of Orange County Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Ferguson, who shot and killed his wife in their Anaheim Hills home in 2023, after jurors said they remained at an impasse over whether he was guilty of second-degree murder.

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Analysis

SEC Leaves Meme Coin Fraud For Other Cops To Chase

By Aislinn Keely

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission staff's decision to say that so-called meme coins are beyond the agency's purview is a welcome change from past practices, experts say, but the devil is in the details when it comes to policing fraud and helping consumers recover when projects go bust.

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High Court Will Review Colo.'s Conversion Therapy Ban

By Katie Buehler

The U.S. Supreme Court announced Monday that it will review a challenge to Colorado's ban on licensed therapists providing conversion therapy to transgender minors, in a case that asks whether the state's law is a permissible regulation of professional conduct or an unconstitutional restriction of speech.

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2 Firms Sued After Cyber Thief Steals $442K From Estate

By Ryan Harroff

Law firms SutterWilliams LLC and Allender & Allender PA were hit with a negligence and malpractice suit after a cybercriminal allegedly used spoofed email accounts to trick an attorney at the latter firm into handing over $442,600 from the sale of a late Pennsylvania sheriff's deputy's house in Florida.

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Hagens Berman Comms With Ghosting Client Kept Privileged

By Ryan Boysen

Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP doesn't have to turn over texts and emails with a client who disappeared from a putative class action against Apple and Amazon, a Washington federal judge has ruled, despite the tech giants' accusations that the firm lied about those communications.

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J. Crew Wins Confirmation Of Ex-GC's Arbitration Loss

By Lauren Berg

A New York federal judge confirmed an arbitrator's ruling Monday that found J. Crew hadn't fired its former legal chief, Maria DiLorenzo, in retaliation for her complaints about colleagues' discriminatory comments about her hearing loss.

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Clerks May Seek Political Jobs On 'Case-By-Case Basis'

By Emily Sawicki

Individual federal judges may determine whether their clerks may seek political posts while employed by the judiciary, the Judicial Conference of the United States' Committee on Codes of Conduct now recommends, months after issuing guidance advising clerks to hold off seeking such roles until their clerkships end.

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Promo that reads 2025 AI Survey Promo that reads 2024 Practice Groups of the Year

LAW FIRMS IN TODAY'S NEWS

A&O Shearman

Allender & Allender

Altshuler Berzon

Arete Law Group

Arnold & Porter

Baker McKenzie

Bernstein Burkley

Bernstein Litowitz

Blake Cassels

Bredin Prat

Brower Piven

Brownstein Hyatt

Clifford Chance

Covington & Burling

Cravath Swaine

Davis Polk

Davis Wright Tremaine

Debevoise & Plimpton

Ellenoff Grossman

Faruqi & Faruqi

Fenwick & West

Hagens Berman

Hamilton Lincoln

Hunton Andrews

K&L Gates

Kahn Swick

Kirkland & Ellis

Latham & Watkins

Lewis Brisbois

Littler Mendelson

Mackenzie Hughes LLP

Malmfeldt Law

Monteverde & Associates

Norton Rose

Orrick Herrington

Paul Hastings

Paul Weiss

Pearman Law Firm

Perkins Coie

RM Law PC

Redgrave LLP

Sidley Austin

Skadden Arps

Slaughter and May

Travers Smith

Weil Gotshal

White & Case

Wigdor LLP

Wilson Sonsini

Winston & Strawn

COMPANIES IN TODAY'S NEWS

AbbVie Inc.

Akorn Inc.

Alliance Defending Freedom

Amazon.com Inc.

Amcor PLC

American Bar Association

American Federation of Government Employees

American Federation of State County & Municipal Employees

Anthropic PBC

Apple Inc.

BMO Capital Markets Corp.

Bank of America Corp.

Barclays PLC

Bessemer Venture Partners

Brunswick Corp.

Cargill Inc.

Chevron Corp.

Constellation Brands Inc.

Euronext Amsterdam NV

Exxon Mobil Corp.

Fort Point Capital

Fresenius Kabi AG

Fresenius SE & Co. KGaA

Hess Corp.

Human Rights Campaign

Instacart

J. Crew Group Inc.

JPMorgan Chase & Co.

KKR & Co. Inc.

Kellanova Co.

Lazard Ltd.

Lightspeed Management Co. LLC

LinkedIn Corp.

Live Nation Entertainment Inc.

Mars Inc.

Michaels Stores Inc.

NASDAQ Inc.

New Mountain Capital LLC

Pioneer Natural Resources Co.

Rocket Cos.

ServiceNow Inc.

Space Exploration Technologies Corp.

Stifel Financial Corp.

Stonepeak Infrastructure Partners

TD Securities Inc.

Tesla Inc.

The Bank of Nova Scotia

Tidal Partners LLC

Unilever PLC

Universities Superannuation Scheme Ltd.

University of Iowa

University of Virginia

Verizon Communications Inc.

Wells Fargo & Co.

Wynn Resorts Ltd.

GOVERNMENT AGENCIES IN TODAY'S NEWS

Colorado Department of Regulatory Agencies

Commodity Futures Trading Commission

Executive Office of the President

Federal Trade Commission

Fish and Wildlife Service

Judicial Conference of the United States

National Park Service

New York Attorney General's Office

New York Supreme Court, New York County

U.S. Agency for International Development

U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of California

U.S. Department of Education

U.S. Department of Justice

U.S. Department of Transportation

U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida

U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California

U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois

U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Iowa

U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York

U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington

U.S. Office of Personnel Management

U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission

U.S. Supreme Court