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Commercial Contracts
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May 16, 2012
DLA Piper Adds DC Corporate Vet From Arnold & Porter
A cross-border mergers and acquisitions attorney with a subspecialty in government contracts and international transactions for private defense companies has left Arnold & Porter LLP and joined DLA Piper as a partner in its Washington office, the firm said Monday.
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May 16, 2012
Texas Refiner Loses Appeal Of $5M Verdict For Hurt Worker
A Texas appeals court Tuesday upheld a jury’s $5.4 million verdict against Pasadena Refining System Inc. in a lawsuit brought by a contractor burned while making repairs at its refinery, but held that PRSI was covered under an insurance policy held by the contractor's employer.
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May 16, 2012
Nationwide Class Certified In PNC Bank Overdraft Charge MDL
A Florida federal judge on Wednesday certified a nationwide class and 11 regional subclasses of account holders in a suit against PNC Bank NA alleging the company used a computer software scheme to illegally collect hundreds of millions of dollars in excessive overdraft fees.
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May 16, 2012
2nd Circ. Says NYU Properly Denied MBA To Insider Trader
New York University's Stern School of Business acted appropriately when it declined to award a Master of Business Administration degree to a student convicted for insider trading, the Second Circuit ruled Wednesday.
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May 16, 2012
Aecom Shakes Negligence Claims In Toxic Housing Suit
A California judge on Wednesday nixed negligence claims alleging environmental consultant Aecom Technical Services Inc. erroneously determined that toxic chemicals from an Exxon Mobil Corp. oil tank storage facility posed no health risks to former residents of a contaminated housing complex.
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May 16, 2012
Renewable Energy Cos. End $129M Solar Project Sale Row
A Florida federal judge on Tuesday dismissed Commercial Solar Power Inc.'s suit alleging ESA Renewables LLC reneged on selling the California renewable energy developer a $129 million solar project in Puerto Rico, after the parties agreed to settle.
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May 15, 2012
Ex-Partner Says Troutman Shafted Him Over $20M MetCap Fee
A former Troutman Sanders LLP partner accused the firm Monday of improperly releasing his signature to allow a merger agreement amendment depriving boutique investment bank MetCap Securities LLC of a $20 million fee for advising on a $2 billion acquisition of a nursing home operator.
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May 15, 2012
Ex-Brocade Worker Seeks Sanctions In Trade Secrets Case
A former Brocade Communications Systems Inc. employee asked a California federal judge on Monday to impose sanctions on the data storage company for allegedly forcing him to defend a groundless lawsuit for nearly two years.
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May 15, 2012
Activision Asks Judge To Delay 'Call Of Duty' IP Trial
Activision Publishing Inc. urged a California state judge on Tuesday to postpone the start of a trial over $1 billion breach-of-contract claims brought by the creators of "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2" who allege Activision cheated them out of royalties from the video game.
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May 15, 2012
AES Rips Utility For Protesting $240M Power Plant Sale
Bankrupt AES Eastern Energy LP accused a New York utility on Monday of improperly taking a contract dispute with the company to regulators weighing approval of the $240 million sale of AES' two operating power plants.
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May 15, 2012
Ex-Deutsche Exec Pushes 2nd Circ. To Revive Bonus Suit
A former top executive with Deutsche Bank AG's Latin American group on Tuesday asked the Second Circuit to reopen his employment contract-related suit against the bank, saying it breached a deal to pay him a large bonus after he defected from a rival.
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May 15, 2012
KEPCO's Nigerian Projects On Hold After Court Ruling
A ruling by the Nigerian Court of Appeals in a complex contract dispute has left Korea Power and Electric Corp.'s oil production and electricity projects in the country on hold, according to a regulatory filing Tuesday.
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May 15, 2012
IKB Sues BofA Over $250M In Soured RMBS Sales
Germany's IKB Deutsche Industriebank AG hit Bank of America Corp. with a pair of lawsuits in New York state court on Monday, accusing BofA of fraudulently selling more than $250 million worth of risky residential mortgage-backed securities.
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May 15, 2012
Biofuels Co. Says PE Firm Skipped Out On $7M Funding Deal
Renewables company Pleasant Valley Biofuels LLC on Sunday accused private equity firm Quest Capital Finance Inc. and an affiliated law firm of shortchanging it on $7 million in promised financing, withheld even after collecting Pleasant Valley's quarter-million-dollar deposit.
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May 15, 2012
Teamsters Victorious In Hostess Contract Fight
In a victory for the Teamsters union in its battle with Hostess Brands Inc., the New York judge in charge of the company's bankruptcy proceedings ruled Monday that Hostess cannot shed its collective bargaining agreements with the union.
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May 14, 2012
Calif. Court Won't Revisit Verdict Over $603M Boeing Contracts
A California appeals court has refused to reconsider an opinion overturning a $603 million jury verdict against a Boeing Co. unit in a dispute with ICO Global Communications Ltd. over two satellite contracts, ICO's parent Pendrell Corp. said Monday.
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May 14, 2012
Naked Juice Gets 'All-Natural' Class Action Stripped Down
A California federal judge on Monday partially dismissed class claims that Naked Juice Co. of Glendora Inc. violated consumer laws by mislabeling its drinks as all-natural, saying a federal warranty claim was permanently barred but that the plaintiffs could restate California consumer law claims.
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May 14, 2012
Nationwide Program Set Agents Up To Fail, Suit Says
A jilted Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co. agent sued the Columbus, Ohio-based insurer Monday, accusing it of luring in hundreds of new exclusive agents with promises of long-term employment only to jettison them and confiscate the business they'd developed.
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May 14, 2012
BofA Urges Judge To Dismiss AIG's $10B RMBS Suit
Bank of America Corp. on Monday urged a California federal judge to dismiss American International Group Inc.'s $10.5 billion lawsuit accusing the bank's Countrywide Financial Corp. of ignoring residential mortgage-backed securities underwriting standards, arguing federal claims against Countrywide are time-barred.
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May 14, 2012
High Court Nixes Psystar Appeal In Apple OS X Copyright Row
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to review the Ninth Circuit’s rejection of Psystar Corp.’s claims that Apple Inc. misused its copyrights in a licensing agreement requiring that its Mac OS X operating system run only on Apple-manufactured computers.
Expert Analysis
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Keys To Co-Lending Agreements In Commercial RE
Co-lending arrangements have long been used by commercial real estate lenders looking to spread risk, increase spreads, improve returns, free up capital and gain other advantages from utilizing participations, syndications, A/B loans and other co-lending vehicles. Practioners should keep in mind a few key considerations when crafting current co-lending agreements, says Hilary Metra Gevondyan of DLA Piper.
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FSMA’s Potential Impact On Commercial Contracts
While a contract's force majeure clause may be boilerplate, the Food Safety Modernization Act provides new reasons to pay greater attention — new provisions of the FSMA, when taken together, greatly increase the probability that your supply chain, or your ability to comply with your contractual obligations, will be disrupted by some regulatory action by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, say Michael Plunkett and Corinne Marie Pouliquen of Blank Rome LLP.
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Trending Topic: Twitter's 'Innovator's Patent Agreement'
Twitter's new “Innovator’s Patent Agreement” — a policy covering assignment of inventions by Twitter employees to Twitter — appears to be an attempt to square the open-source ethos of Silicon Valley developers with the reality that software patents are becoming increasingly valuable assets to their employers, says Andrew Liddell of Fulbright & Jaworski LLP.
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In-License Agreements With Nonprofits: 5 Considerations
Many of the most profitable technologies being developed and commercialized by tech companies — particularly in the areas of life sciences and clean technology — were initially developed by nonprofit institutions. There are five often overlooked issues that should be considered by a company when negotiating an in-license agreement with nonprofits, say attorneys with Mintz Levin Cohn Ferris Glovsky and Popeo PC.
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Using Federal Antitrust Law To Void Class Action Waivers
Following the Second Circuit's decision in In re American Express Merchants’ Litigation, class action arbitration waivers may be voidable if the plaintiffs can show that the enforcement of those waivers will strip them of their federal statutory rights under the Sherman Act, say Michael Christian and Demetrius Lambrinos of Zelle Hofmann Voelbel & Mason LLP.
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Resolving Life Science Collaboration Disputes
Life science companies frequently collaborate to develop drugs or devices. Some collaboration agreements refer disputes to arbitration. Others are silent so any disputes go to court. On the whole, arbitration works better to resolve disputes that occur during the collaboration, while court litigation works at least as well and maybe better to resolve disputes that occur after the collaboration ceases, says Kirke Hasson of Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP
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Circuit Split? Mirant Vs. Adelphia
The Fifth Circuit decision in In re Mirant Corp. appears to be in direct conflict with Adelphia Recovery Trust v. Bank of America NA, but a closer analysis reveals that the two decisions are reconcilable. Unfortunately, the court in Mirant adopted legal conclusions without much analysis — or any mention of the analysis provided by Adelphia — making the status of this area of law unclear, says Vincent Roldan of Vandenberg & Feliu LLP.
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How To Negotiate Rights Of 1st Offers
A right of first offer to lease is a contractual provision granting a tenant a preemptive right to lease additional space during its lease term. A ROFO is particularly useful in cases in which a tenant expects to grow during its lease term. When carefully negotiated, a ROFO can be beneficial to a tenant and not detrimental to a landlord, say Matthew Swett and Lauren Balsamo of Pepper Hamilton LLP.
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Where Rubber Hits Road: Examples Of Alternative Fees
Creating new approaches to fee agreements is something to embrace rather than fear — and when structured and managed correctly, it can be financially advantageous. Take, for example, fixed-fee arrangements, result-based billing and portfolio billing, say Bill Rudnick and Keith Maziarek of DLA Piper.
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A Call To Arms — 365(n) And Trademark Licensees
The Seventh Circuit decision in In re Lakewood Engineering & Manufacturing Co. Inc. is much anticipated and will be extremely important for trademark licensees. It will, however, be even more important as a guide for statutory construction and the appropriate use of legislative history, say Victor Vilaplana and Matt Riopelle of Foley & Lardner LLP.