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Leprino Foods Co. is the largest manufacturer of mozzarella cheese in the world and is solely responsible for making all the mozzarella that goes on top of Domino’s, Papa John’s, and Pizza Hut’s pizzas. It’s worth billions of dollars, but it’s also a family business.

It was founded in Denver, Colorado in the 1950s by Michael and Susie Leprino. The couple had five children, including Michael Jr. and James. James went into the family business as soon as he had graduated from high school, and while Michael Jr. was involved in the business, he also had his own career in banking and real estate.

James and his daughters, Terry Leprino and Gina Vecchiarelli, together own 75% of the company’s stock.

Michael Jr. died in August of 2018 and his daughters, Nancy, Mary, and Laura Leprino, together own the remaining 25% of the stock in the company. In July, Nancy and Mary sued their uncle and cousins in Denver District Court for allegedly managing the company in a way that provided the greatest financial reward for them, while ignoring the financial interests of the minority shareholders.

The lawsuit alleges James and his daughters tend to align their votes so the outcome always provides them with the greatest financial benefits, but allegedly leaves Nancy and Mary out in the cold. Nancy and Mary also allege they have been unable to obtain financial records to which they are legally entitled as shareholders of the company. Continue reading ›

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A business made loans to the son of its founder and never required the loans to be repaid. The business later attempted to write off the loans as bad debts or as ordinary and necessary business expenses. The IRS pursued the business, seeking $92 million in back taxes. The company petitioned the tax court, but after a trial the court upheld the agency’s determination, finding that the debts could not be written off because the company and the founder’s son lacked a bonafide creditor-debtor relationship. The company appealed and the appellate panel affirmed, finding that the company routinely deferred payment or renewed promissory notes without any receipt of payments and that it did not expect to be repaid unless various other events occurred. The panel determined that the company had not shown that it presented sufficient existence of a bonafide relationship to the tax court and it, therefore, affirmed the decision of the lower court.

Ron Van Den Heuvel’s father founded VHC in 1985 to provide services to the paper manufacturing industry. Ron and his four brothers all worked for VHC or its subsidiaries in some capacity, but Ron found particular success. Ron started at two of VHC’s subsidiaries, directed a number of its other companies, and launched his own companies separate from VHC. Between 1997 and 2013, VHC advanced $111 million to Ron and his companies. The payments fulfilled several purposes, including paying debts owed by both Ron and his companies. Ron and his companies would come to owe VHC $132 million, with interest, by 2013, but would only repay $39 million.

In 2004, VHC began writing off its payments to Ron as “bad debts,” ultimately writing off $95 million by 2013. After an audit, the IRS issued a notice of deficiency to VHC rejecting $92 million of the write-offs. VHC petitioned the tax court, and after a ten-day bench trial, the tax court upheld the agency’s deficiency finding. The court determined that Ron’s debts could not be written off because VHC and Ron lacked a bonafide debtor-creditor relationship. VHC then appealed. Continue reading ›

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Business partnerships sometimes come to an end. As we have written about previously, it is important going into a partnership to have an agreed-upon exit strategy in place. However, as a recent decision from an Indiana appeals court highlights, it is important for business partners to not only include exit provisions in their partnership agreements, operating agreements, or shareholder agreements but to carefully think through the wording of the provisions to avoid disputes and misunderstandings later.

In Hartman v. BigInch Fabricators & Construction Holding Company, Inc., the dispute considered by the court involved interpretation of a provision in the parties’ shareholder agreement that required the company to purchase the shares of any shareholder who was involuntarily terminated at “appraised market value on the last day of the year preceding the valuation, determined in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles by a third-party valuation company.”

The plaintiff in the case, Blake Hartman, was a co-founder and longtime president and director of the company called BigInch Fabricators & Construction Holding Company. Hartman was one ten shareholders, none of which owned a majority stake in the company. In 2006, the shareholders entered into a shareholder agreement.

The agreement included a buyback provision (also known as a repurchase agreement) requiring the company to purchase the shares of any shareholder who was involuntarily terminated as an officer or director of the company. The purchase was to be made at “appraised market value on the last day of the year preceding the valuation, determined in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles by a third-party valuation company.” The agreement did not define the term “appraised market value” or elaborate on the methodology to be used by a third party in performing the valuation.

In March 2018, Hartman was involuntarily terminated as a director and officer of BigInch. At the time of his termination, Hartman owned 8,884 shares in the company, representing a 17.77% interest. As required by the shareholder agreement, the company hired an appraiser to calculate the value of the company for the purposes of valuing Harman’s shares for repurchase. The appraiser calculated the fair market value of Hartman’s shares to be $2,398,000.00, which included discounts for the marketability of the shares and the lack of control represented by Hartman’s minority interest.

Hartman filed a declaratory judgment action contesting the valuation and requesting that the court declare the value of his shares. Hartman argued that the appraiser’s application of the “fair market value” standard to value his shares was not in accordance with the agreement because that standard presupposes an “open market” of willing sellers and willing buyers.

At the outset of its analysis, the Court began by explaining the utility of buyback provisions or repurchase agreements like those included in the BigInch shareholder agreement. Close corporations generally lack a market for their shares, the Court explained, because the only people interested in owning the business are the “incorporated partners” who are intimately involved with the entity. Because there is often no market for one’s shares, it is difficult and speculative to value a close corporation’s shares, which is why repurchase agreements frequently specify the valuation method to be used.

The Court turned its attention to two popular business valuation methods: the “fair value” method and the “fair market value” method. The Court next outlined the differences between the two methods. The “fair value” standard seeks to ensure that shareholders were fairly compensated. The “fair market value” standard, on the other hand, attempts to determine the amount that a willing seller and willing buyer would arrive at after negotiations. Because the fair market value standard attempts to approximate the results of a real-life negotiation, discounts for lack of control and lack of marketability are appropriate.

The question for the Court was which valuation method did the BigInch shareholder agreement require. The agreement did not specify but instead only required an “appraised market value.” The trial court held that this required application of the fair market value method which permitted discounts for lack of marketability and lack of control. On appeal, the Court disagreed and held that the proper valuation methodology in a forced sale is the fair value method.

The Court concluded that “minority and control discounts have no application in compelled transactions to a controlling party.” Applying such discounts in forced sales involving the company purchasing back shares from a minority shareholder would result in a windfall to the purchasing majority shareholder or shareholders. A windfall would result because “a sale of the minority shareholders’ shares to majority shareholders consolidates or increases the power of those already in control.” Given that the majority shareholders are already benefitting by increasing their power, it does not follow that the majority shareholders should be able to realize this benefit at a discount.

The Court’s full opinion is available online here. Continue reading ›

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After the governor of Illinois issued an executive order banning gatherings greater than 50 people due to the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, the Illinois Republican Party sued. The state GOP alleged that the order’s carve out for religious services violated the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment because it privileged religious services over other types of speech, including political speech. The appellate panel disagreed, finding that the order did not violate the Free Exercise Clause because it was clear that speech that accompanies religious exercise had a privileged position under the First Amendment and that the executive order permissibly accommodated religious activities.

In response to the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, Governor J. B. Pritzker of Illinois has issued a series of executive orders designed to limit the virus’ opportunities to spread. The Illinois Republican Party and some of its affiliates believe that one executive order issued by Pritzker, a ban on gatherings of groups larger than 50, violated the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment because it contained a carve-out for the free exercise of religion, which allowed religious organizations to gather in groups of larger than 50 individuals.

The plaintiffs sought a permanent injunction against EO 43, assuming that such an injunction would permit them to gather in groups larger than 50, rather than reinstate the stricter ban for religion that some of the Governor’s earlier executive orders included. The district court denied the plaintiffs’ request for an injunction, and the plaintiffs appealed.

The appellate panel began by stating that the argument of the plaintiffs was essentially that religious groups were privileged over other groups in terms of limits on gatherings and that the only difference between the religious groups and others was the content of their speech. The panel found that, based on the Supreme Court’s Religion Clause cases, it was clear that speech that accompanies religious exercise has a privileged position under the First Amendment, and that EO43 permissibly accommodates religious activities. Continue reading ›

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An employee of a wine-making company was sued by his former employer for starting a competing business while he was still serving as the company’s president. The company also alleged that he misused his position as president to sell the same wine under the company’s brand and the brand of his new company, while assigning lower prices to the wine from his new brand, thereby siphoning sales away from the winemaker. After a trial, a jury found in favor of the company but awarded it no damages. The company appealed, arguing that the jury’s verdict was inconsistent with its findings regarding liability. The appellate panel disagreed, finding that the jury could reasonably have concluded that though the ex-employee was liable, his actions did not cause the company any significant financial harm. The panel upheld the verdict and the judgment of the district court.

Gerald Forsythe formed Indeck-Paso Robles, LLC for the purpose of creating and managing a wine-grape vineyard. In 2006, Indeck purchased Shimmin Canyon Vineyard in Paso Robles, California. Forsythe later established Continental Vineyard LLC, as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Indeck, for the purpose of operating Shimmin Canyon. Forsythe appointed himself chairman and CEO and named Randy Dzierzawski president. Dzierzawski was in charge of all of Continental’s day-to-day operations.

Though the two originally intended for Continental to only operate as a grape-growing enterprise, they eventually decided that they wished to branch out into winemaking. Continental then hired Chris Cameron, and experienced vintner, as Director of Winemaking. In 2010, Cameron and Dzierzawski, on behalf of Continental, met with Mark Esterman, a wine buyer for the Meijer grocery store chain to discuss developing custom wine for the store. Dzierzawski brought the opportunity to Forsythe, but Forsythe declined to pursue it, finding it to be a money loser. Continue reading ›

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Envoy Medical is a medical device manufacturer based in Minnesota with technology that has the ability to restore hearing to the deaf. Unfortunately, the company’s prospects were allegedly cut short after Glen Taylor took over as CEO, which not only caused financial harm to the company but denied life-changing technology to the deaf.

As CEO of the medical-device company, Patrick Spearman guided the company to the early success it enjoyed, including getting FDA approval for the invention and marketing the company’s new device as a replacement for hearing aids. A video advertising the device that showed a mother getting emotional when she heard her voice for the first time after getting the implant went viral.

Another remarkable story of the potential of the device was of a Deputy Sheriff with profound hearing loss who, after receiving the implant, passed the hearing test that allows him to work the streets, while law enforcement officers with hearing aids are kept off the streets.

The medical invention was also featured on a variety of prominent television programs, including The Celebrity Apprentice, CNN, and the Ellen DeGeneres Show, among others. In 2011, Google gave the company an award for having created one of the top 11 inventions of the year.

In 2012, Taylor’s daughter was fired with cause by Spearman’s management team, at which point Taylor allegedly retaliated by having Spearman fired as CEO and taking his place in that role. Taylor allegedly then went on to fire all the key people who had the knowledge necessary to ensure the company’s financial success.

The billionaire business owner and majority shareholder of the Minnesota Timberwolves and the Minneapolis Star Tribune allegedly went on to use his money and influence to force control of the company out of the hands of its shareholders by using a series of loans and preferred share purchases to dilute their voting power. According to the lawsuit, the terms of those loans and purchases were allegedly not fully disclosed to the shareholders. Continue reading ›

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LVMH Moët Hennessy-Louis Vuitton SE was scheduled to acquire Tiffany & Co. no later than August 24th, 2020, but the merger came to a halt when LVMH failed to even apply for antitrust clearance.

Antitrust laws exist to avoid monopolies. If two major companies merge to form one company, there’s a fear that the existence of a huge corporation, which now owns the market shares of both companies involved, might dominate the industry, thereby making it difficult, or even impossible for any other company to compete with them. Since healthy competition promotes innovation and helps drive down prices, it’s necessary for a healthy economy.

As a result, when two major corporations merge to form one company, they have to file for antitrust clearance with the authorities in the markets in which they operate, meaning the authorities look at the market share of the two companies and agree that the merger would not create a monopoly. But according to a recent lawsuit filed by Tiffany, LVMH has not only failed to acquire the antitrust clearance by the agreed-upon date but has failed to even file for antitrust clearance.

The terms of the merger allowed for an extension to November 24th, 2020 if antitrust clearance had not been obtained by August 24th, but the fact that LVMH still has yet to even file for antitrust clearance in two of the three relevant markets raises doubts about whether they’re taking this merger seriously. Tiffany has responded by filing a lawsuit in the Court of Chancery of the State of Delaware.

The lawsuit is asking the court to provide an order that LVMH must abide by the terms of the acquisition, which had been agreed upon by both companies.

Even before the lawsuit was filed the acquisition had been having problems. LVMH had claimed that Tiffany had suffered a Material Adverse Effect (MAE) as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, and had tried to buy shares of Tiffany at a lower price per share than the price they had agreed upon in the terms of the contract. Continue reading ›

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Apple’s app store is one of the most popular in the world, which means you need to play nice with Apple if you’re creating an app and you want to get in front of the millions of people who use Apple’s store to download apps. But Apple takes a percentage of every payment made to an app creator through their app store, which is why it retaliated after Epic Games introduced a new in-app payment system within their videogame, “Fortnite”. Apple removed the game from its app store as soon as it became aware of the update to the popular videogame.

Epic responded with a lawsuit that asked the court for an injunction against Apple that would require the tech giant to put the game back in its app store. It claimed Apple is acting as a monopoly with a payment system that allegedly suppresses competition and inflates prices.

Apple countersued with a claim that the videogame company had breached its contract with Apple by introducing an in-app payment system within the game that avoided the 30% cut every other app creator pays Apple and Google for placement in their app stores. Within hours of the addition of the in-app payment system, both tech giants had removed “Fortnite” from their app stores.

In its own complaint, Apple accused Epic, a multi-billion-dollar company, of trying to derive significant financial benefit from placing its videogame in Apple’s app store without sharing any of those profits with Apple.

Back in June, Tim Sweeney, Epic’s CEO, emailed executives of Apple, including the CEO, Tim Cook, asking for a special agreement that would exempt Epic from some of its contractual obligations, including the ones dealing with payments made in the app store. Apple rejected those terms, and in early August Epic sent to the app store an updated version of “Fortnite” that the company described as a “hotfix”, but Apple alleges it was more like a Trojan horse. The “hotfix” version of the videogame allegedly allowed it to bypass Apple’s normal review process and payment system, thereby allowing Epic to sneak into Apple’s app store a videogame that charged customers in the app, rather than in the app store.

Once the “Trojan horse” version of the videogame was in Apple’s app store, Sweeney sent another email to Apple saying that his company refused to abide by Apple’s payment processing rules, after which his company activated the in-app payment system, which Apple alleges was little more than theft.

Apple’s app store has about 1 billion global customers, and in just the first seven months of 2020, in-app purchases, premium apps, and subscriptions generated almost $39 billion in global revenue. Apple claims the fees it takes from app purchases help the company fund the development and maintenance of an app store that provides a safe and secure environment for customers to purchase and download third-party software.

For Epic’s part, the videogame company has earned more than $600 million by working with Apple. Continue reading ›

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In a unanimous opinion, the U.S. Supreme Court recently ruled that allowing nonsignatories to an international arbitration agreement to compel arbitration through domestic equitable estoppel doctrines does not conflict with the signatory requirement of the U.N. Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards (known as the New York Convention).

That case, GE Energy Power Conversion France SAS v Outokumpu Steamless USA, LLC, stems from a 2007 contract between a contractor and steel manufacturer for the construction of mills in the manufacturer’s steel plant. The plaintiff, an international subsidiary of the global power company, General Electric, had been subcontracted by the contractor to produce nine motors for the mills. Outokumpu Stainless USA, LLC (which acquired ownership of the plant), and its insurers sued GE Energy after the motors allegedly failed.

GE Energy moved to dismiss the case and sought to compel arbitration by enforcing the arbitration clauses in the contract between the contractor and steel manufacturer. A Federal District Court granted the motion to dismiss and compel arbitration. The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals reversed, holding that the New York Convention: (i) requires parties seeking to compel arbitration to be signatories of the arbitration agreement, and (ii) precludes the use of state-law doctrines of equitable estoppel to compel arbitration in conflict with the Convention’s signatory requirement. In reversing the Eleventh Circuit, the Supreme Court held that use of state law doctrines of equitable estoppel to compel arbitration by nonsignatories to an international arbitration agreement was not barred by or conflict with the New York Convention.

Before announcing its holding, the Court first analyzed the two primary authorities at issue in the case, the Federal Arbitration Act (“FAA”) and the New York Convention. The Court began it discussion by noting its previous holdings that the FAA permits a nonsignatory to rely on state-law equitable estoppel doctrines to enforce an arbitration agreement. Generally, in the arbitration context, the Court explained “equitable estoppel allows a nonsignatory to a written agreement containing an arbitration clause to compel arbitration where a signatory to the written agreement must rely on the terms of that agreement in asserting its claims against the nonsignatory.” Continue reading ›

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After partners in a closely held corporation entered into years of adversarial litigation, a settlement agreement was reached. One of the partners later sued the other two, alleging that he was fraudulently induced into agreeing to the settlement when the defendant’s counsel misrepresented the financial position of the corporation at the time of the settlement. The circuit court dismissed the plaintiff’s complaint, finding that the defendants did not owe him a fiduciary duty during the litigation settlement discussions. The appellate court reversed, determining that because there was no document specifying that the parties’ relationship had been dissolved at the time of the settlement talks, the defendants still owed the plaintiff a fiduciary duty, and there was a question of material fact as to whether the resulting settlement agreement was valid. The appellate panel then reversed the decision of the circuit court.

Samuel Arndt, III, Nicholas Nardulli, and Diana Johnson were shareholders in Redhawk Financial Services, Inc. Arndt owned 49 percent of Redhawk’s shares; Nardulli was the controlling shareholder, a director, and the president of Redhawk; Johnson was a shareholder, a director, and the secretary of Redhawk. In December 2012, Redhawk filed a complaint against Arndt for breach of fiduciary duty. The complaint alleged that Arndt withdrew over $100,000 from Redhawk without an apparent business justification and also diverted Redhawk’s commissions into Arndt’s personal bank account. Arndt filed a counterclaim against Redhawk as well as a third-party complaint against Nardulli and Johnson, alleging breach of fiduciary duty and oppression of him as a minority shareholder. Continue reading ›

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