Innovation in Compliance - Key Board Issues Going Forward with Christina Bresani
The Court of Chancery continues its consideration of whether a director or officer’s oversight duties, set forth in the seminal case of In re Caremark International Inc. Derivative Litigation and its progeny, apply to...more
In Segway Inc. v. Hong Cai, 2023 Del. Ch. LEXIS 643 (Del. Ch. Dec. 14, 2023), the Delaware Court of Chancery (Will, V.C.) dismissed a claim for breach of fiduciary duty brought by Segway Inc. (the “Company”) against its...more
The Delaware Court of Chancery recently held that claims for breach of the fiduciary duty of oversight are not easier to plead against corporate officers than against corporate directors. The decision in Segway Inc. v. Cai...more
In a case of first impression, the Court of Chancery held recently that officers, like directors, owe their companies a duty of oversight, although the scope of that will vary with their responsibilities. Two other Chancery...more
On January 25, 2023, Vice Chancellor Laster of the Court of Chancery issued a significant decision, finding as a matter of first impression that corporate officers owe a duty of oversight akin to the oversight duties owed by...more
Here we have another in a string of McDonald’s cases—all of them arising out of workplace misconduct at McDonald’s, none even dipping its toe into employment law. First, you’ll remember, there were settled charges brought by...more
In our February 14, 2023 Stay Current, we discussed a Delaware Court of Chancery decision allowing shareholder derivative claims to proceed against a corporate officer for alleged oversight duty failures stemming from...more
Key Takeaways - In a case of first impression, the Delaware Court of Chancery issued a decision that could give investors more time to sue corporate directors and officers for Caremark breach of fiduciary duty claims. ...more
Delaware law has long recognized a director’s duty of oversight. The well-established doctrine, first articulated in 1996 in In Re: Caremark International Inc. Derivative Litigation, was recently expanded to officers in In re...more
Earlier this year, we wrote about Delaware’s recent statutory changes extending certain protections to corporate officers that were previously only afforded to directors. As we mentioned in that advisory, an exception to the...more
On January 26, 2023, the Delaware Court of Chancery resolved a long-standing ambiguity in Delaware law, clarifying, for the first time, that corporate officers owe a fiduciary duty of oversight. The case, In re McDonald’s...more
On Jan. 25, 2023, the Delaware Court of Chancery issued an opinion with significant implications for American corporate law. In denying the defendants’ motion to dismiss in In re McDonald’s Corporation Stockholder Derivative...more
It is well established that corporate officers owe the same fiduciary duties as directors under Delaware law. However, the Delaware courts have not had occasion to consider every species of fiduciary duty claim against...more
In In re McDonald’s Corporation, defendant David Fairhurst, who formerly served as Executive Vice President and Global Chief People Officer of McDonald’s Corporation, contested a stockholders’ claim that he had breached his...more
The Delaware Court of Chancery on Sept. 7, 2021, allowed a derivative stockholder lawsuit to proceed against The Boeing Company (Boeing), alleging that Boeing's board of directors breached their fiduciary duties by failing to...more
In 2019, the Delaware Supreme Court issued Marchand v. Barnhill, which was soon followed by the Court of Chancery’s opinion in In re Clovis Oncology Derivative Litigation. Both rulings sustained derivative claims for breach...more
The dawn of a new decade brings with it the certainty of ongoing challenges to the conduct of public company directors based on alleged breaches of fiduciary duty. This note is a brief reminder for directors of Delaware...more
Consistent with trends in recent years, in 2019 Delaware corporation law largely was shaped by post-closing suits for money damages against directors who had approved mergers and acquisitions. Two Delaware Supreme Court...more
Given evolving Delaware law, understanding the difference between “risk oversight” and “risk management” is an increasingly important board task. In the Marchand and Clovis decisions, the Delaware courts sent an important...more
Health care provider boards of directors have been put on notice—given these two recent Delaware court decisions - Clovis and Marchand—that courts may be willing to significantly extend a corporate board’s Caremark duty to...more
On October 1, 2019, the Delaware Court of Chancery issued its decision in In re Clovis Oncology, Inc. Derivative Litigation, C.A. No. 2017-0222-JRS (Del. Ch. Oct. 1, 2019), which addresses the duties of directors to oversee...more
Following this summer’s much publicized decision by the Delaware Supreme Court in the Marchand v. Barnhill (Blue Bell Creameries) case, the Delaware Court of Chancery’s holding in In re Clovis Oncology, Inc. Derivative...more
On October 1, 2019, in In re Clovis Oncology, Inc. Derivative Litigation, a Delaware Chancery Court denied a motion to dismiss the plaintiffs’ claims under the Caremark decision against individual directors for failing to...more
Board oversight of significant company risk areas and legal compliance deserves renewed attention, as the Delaware Supreme Court recently ruled that monitoring practices that have previously been considered acceptable may...more
On October 1, 2019, the Court of Chancery rendered an opinion in In re Clovis Oncology, Inc. Derivative Litigation, denying a motion to dismiss a Caremark claim for breach of fiduciary duty and reinforcing a director’s duty...more