Navigating Corporate Divorce With Michael Einbinder
Law Brief ®: Alan Gaynor and Richard Schoenstein Explore Business Divorce
Episode 17: Arbitrating Deadlock: A Conversation with Arbitrator Erica Garay
Episode 014: Business Divorce Stories: Business Appraiser Tony Cotrupe and Attorney Jeff Eilender
On this episode of “Splitting Heirs,” Warren K. Racusin talks with Lowenstein partner Nick San Filippo IV, Chair of the firm’s Business Divorce practice, and Jeff Savlov, a partner in the family business and wealth consulting...more
Join long-standing Digital Partner and IR Global member Michael Einbinder in his latest conversation with Jennifer Riggins as he helps you navigate the rocky landscape of Corporate Divorce. Be it a breach in fiduciary duty,...more
In matters of corporate divorce, deadlock, majority oppression, or usurpation of corporate opportunities are all well-tread grounds for disputes between co-owners of closely held entities. These disputes often culminate in...more
I recently had the privilege of speaking to an audience of judges of the New York Supreme Court Commercial Division at Fordham Law School’s Eileen Bransten Institute on Complex Commercial Litigation. Naturally, the topic was...more
While no one enters a partnership expecting it to end in divorce, no one is immune to failure. In the world of business, partnerships can sometimes mirror the complexities of personal relationships. Often, it is the “we’ve...more
Resolving ownership disputes with a buyout at auction has a tempting simplicity. The buyout gives the owners the divorce they need. And the auction—particularly a blind auction, in which no owner is aware of the other’s...more
When a minority shareholder petitions for dissolution of a corporation on the grounds of oppressive or illegal conduct (see BCL 1104-a), Section 1118 of New York’s Business Corporation Law allows the corporation or any other...more
Litigated business breakups are often highly intense and emotional for the participants. The intensity and emotion multiply when the litigants are close family members....more
In many instances, an irreconcilable dispute leads business partners to break up, and sometimes end up in litigation. Even when owners get along great, life events such as failing health may force someone to depart the...more
This blog frequently covers cases considering a shareholder’s request to dissolve a corporation under New York’s oppression-based corporate dissolution statute, BCL 1104-a. That statute allows a shareholder to petition for...more
The dissolution of a company—and the winddown and liquidation that usually follow—often impacts a broad range of stakeholders beyond just the owners of the company, including creditors and potential creditors, who often are...more
In 1950, Sam Hoffman and his two sons, Hyman and Melvin, founded Brooklyn-based Cornell Beverages, Inc. to manufacture and distribute seltzer. Those were the days when “seltzer men” made weekly home deliveries of cases of...more
Some of the most complex and hotly-contested business divorce litigation arises from the dissolution of law firms. Perhaps law firm dissolutions are prone to litigation because many are organized as partnerships or LLPs, and...more
You know you’re in big trouble if the post-trial decision in a lawsuit you filed begins like this: “The court finds the plaintiff, Rowen Seibel, not credible. This is primarily because it appears he fabricated evidence...more
It’s hard not to feel sorry for the petitioner in Fernandes v Matrix Model Staffing, Inc., Decision and Order, Index No. 160294/2021 [Sup Ct, NY County Apr. 20, 2022]. In Fernandes, Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Frank...more
It’s been another year of important case law developments in business divorce controversies. I’m pleased to present my 14th annual list of the past year’s ten most significant cases....more
So you carefully negotiated a dissolution or separation from your former business partner in what seemed like an amicable parting… but then you wound up in litigation anyway. “How is that possible?” you ask. Unfortunately, it...more
It is an old saw that partners, co-venturers, and insiders to closely held businesses owe fiduciary duties of loyalty and due care when dealing with one another. Importantly, these fiduciary duties modify the common law of...more
A business divorce occurs when two or more business partners sever their commercial relationship. Business divorce frequently involves friction, stress, and disagreement – so identifying what you want to achieve at the onset...more
Very few divorces end with a clear “winner” as famously observed by the late, great Jerry Reed in “She Got the Goldmine (I Got the Shaft).” That is as true in a personal divorce as it is a “business divorce.” Business...more
In an article from a little over a month ago, we summarized New York’s LLC judicial dissolution statute with the comment, “Breaking up can be hard to do.”...more
As I wrote here, in 2016 the Manhattan-based Appellate Division, First Department decided Raharney Capital LLC v Capital Stack LLC, overruling its own precedent and joining appellate rulings by the other Departments holding...more
Recently, we’ve written two articles focusing on the brewing dispute over whether New York law recognizes a viable cause of action for “common-law” or “equitable” dissolution of a limited liability company....more
The heyday of common-law dissolution — if it ever had one — is long past, largely displaced by a statutory dissolution remedy for oppressed minority shareholders paired with an elective buy-out option for the respondent...more
A Delaware Court of Chancery case decided earlier this year provides some useful guidance on the interpretation of LLC agreements and what constitutes a “deadlock” under Delaware law. The case, Mehra v. Teller, involved a...more