Overview
Our corporate lawyers have extensive mergers and acquisitions experience involving tax-free and taxable mergers, equity and asset acquisitions and dispositions, auction transactions, leveraged buyouts, spinoffs, joint ventures, and strategic acquisition and divestiture programs, among other matters. We work closely with our clients’ senior managers to conduct due diligence and to structure, negotiate and document transactions in a responsive, cost-efficient manner.
As part of our M&A practice, we routinely advise clients on securities issues, representing both targets and acquirers in negotiated, unsolicited and "going private" transactions. We advise clients on unfriendly takeovers and defensive tactics and have developed a number of shareholder rights plans designed to give boards of directors the power to deal with hostile bids. Our firm also counsels clients on the effects of state anti-takeover legislation.
We counsel both strategic buyers and sellers and private equity investors making and financing leveraged buyouts and other acquisitions or selling portfolio investments and companies. We seek to create a team of lawyers to work on the debt, equity and other transactional layers of investments and buyouts in a seamless fashion.
We use our extensive background in securities regulation, private equity investments, corporate and commercial law, and banking and capital markets to advise boards of directors and senior management on all aspects of M&A transactions, including fiduciary duties, Securities and Exchange Commission rules and regulations, and a variety of equity and debt financing techniques. Where needed, we staff our client-focused M&A teams with experts in tax, antitrust, real estate, environmental law, labor, employee benefits and intellectual property, among other areas, to provide our clients with comprehensive experience on matters critical to the transaction.
Experience
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Represented Raycom Media Inc., one of the nation's largest privately owned media companies, in its acquisition by Gray Television Inc. for $3.65 billion.
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Represented AmWINS Group Inc. in connection with a strategic investment of a one-third interest in AmWINS Group by the Public Sector Pension Investment Board (PSP Investments), a Canadian pension investment manager.
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Represented Ulysses Management, a diversified investment firm with over $1 billion in capital under management, in its sale of Electric Guard Dog, the largest provider of monitored electric security fences in the United States.
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Represented Enpro Inc., a publicly traded leading technology company and materials science business (NYSE: NPO), in the acquisition and disposition of various businesses, including the sale of its Fairbanks Morse division to an affiliate of Arcline Investment Management for $450 million and the acquisition of Alluxa Inc., a privately held company specializing in optical filters and thin-film precision coatings.
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Represented Juggernaut Capital, a Washington, D.C.-based private equity firm with in excess of $725 million in committed capital, in its acquisition of the assets of Mitchell & Ness Nostalgia Co., a leading international lifestyle brand specifically within the sports licensed retro authentic apparel and headwear industry.
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Represented the Special Committee of the Board of Directors of First Citizens Bancorporation in the company's merger into First Citizens BancShares, resulting in a combined bank with more than $30 billion in assets.
Accolades
Honors & Recognitions
- Chambers USA, Band 1 or Band 2 for corporate/M&A, 2003-25
- Best Law Firms, National Tier 2 for litigation - mergers & acquisitions, 2020-26; National Tier 3 for litigation - mergers & acquisitions, 2019; Charlotte Tier 1 for mergers & acquisitions law, 2011-26; Charlotte Tier 1 for litigation - mergers & acquisitions, 2012-26; Raleigh Tier 1 for mergers & acquisitions law, 2025
- IFLR1000, North Carolina Tier 1, mergers & acquisitions, 2019-25
