New England Biz Law Update

With competition for legal work as fierce as ever, a number of practices and concerns have emerged among general counsel in selecting law firms to represent their companies. Outside counsel should provide superior service that stems from a genuine interest ...

Proposed changes to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure that address the issue of “electronic discovery” have been approved by a committee of the U.S. Judicial Conference. The changes must still be approved by the Conference, the U.S. Supreme Court ...

Dolan Media Company has acquired the 14 newspapers and associated websites of Lawyers Weekly, Inc., a leading publisher for the legal profession. The deal closed Aug. 31. Purchase price and terms were not disclosed. James P. Dolan, president and chief ...

A well-conceived intellectual property-licensing program can advance your company’s objectives, maximize profits and provide your company with many advantages. For example, dormant projects can be turned into revenue, new markets can be penetrated, future business partners can be evaluated, future ...

The Portland, Maine-based law firm of Verill & Dana is set to expand to Boston with the opening of its newest office in September. The Boston office will be the firm’s sixth, with five existing locations in Portland, Augusta, and ...

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have resulted in what some have termed the largest mobilization of military reservists and National Guard troops since World War II. With any luck, these troops will be returning home quickly and safely. When ...

All the Securities and Exchange Commission wants to do is eliminate a hotbed of fraud arising from trading shares of "shell corporations." You might think that such an admirable task would be universally endorsed. You would be wrong. "Shell" corporations ...

A company needing specific intellectual property to round out its product or define its market has two options – build it or buy it. The first option can prove costly and slow. The second option can be much faster and ...

On May 4, investment banker Frank Quattrone was convicted of obstructing a grand jury investigation, obstructing SEC investigators and witness tampering. The charges carry a maximum sentence of 20 years imprisonment and $500,000 in fines. Quattrone’s crime? Forwarding an e-mail ...

For those who cannot sleep at night as they wrestle with securities disclosure issues (and I know from experience that this is not a farfetched scenario), the Security and Exchange Commission’s new 8-K rules offer no cure for insomniacs. The ...