The Florida State College of Law Research Center Blog

Chrysler Ch. 11 Proceeding

The Chrysler Ch. 11 petition is available from Scribd: http://www.scribd.com/doc/14802124/Chrysler-Ch11-Proceeding .

Posted by Jon Lutz

Chinese E-Commerce 2008

An article on selling products in China titled Chinese E-Commerce 2008: An Introduction and How to for US SMEs by Lisa Conklin has been posted on the internet. A hat tip to the China Law Blog.  Here's an excerpt from the article:

An antitrust law came into effect this year but legal experts expect it will often be pointless to try to enforce non CCP-supported cases with it in the short to mid term. One reason is because of the large number of state-owned enterprises (SOEs), which want to avoid more massive layoffs and ensuing social unrest. The other reason is because of strong local protectionism. Local CCP member income and status can depend on the success of local firms.

Read the article here.

Posted by Jon Lutz

Experts Say Treasury Conflict Rules Are Unprecedented

The AMLawDaily has an interesting article about client conflict rules in the Treasury Departments bailout of some firms.  Here's an excerpt:

When The Am Law Daily read the client conflict rules in the Treasury Department's $5.5 million bailout contracts with Hughes Hubbard and Reed and Squire, Sanders & Dempsey, one clause struck us as particularly onerous: both firms agreed not to represent any bank or financial institution Treasury buys assets from as long as Treasury owns equity in that institution. Experts have estimated the capital purchase program may involve as many as 2,500 financial institutions. That's a lot of potential clients.

So we called two well-known ethics experts, New York University's Stephen Gillers and Boston University's Nancy Moore, and asked them about the conflicts provisions. Both agreed: they've never quite seen conflicts rules like these.

"Treasury is being very demanding," Gillers says. "They are putting the fear of God into these law firms."

Read the article here.

Posted by Jon Lutz

DuPont Legal Model

In the early 1990s, the legal department at DuPont launched an initiative to reduce the number of external law firms employed, streamline the management of more than 4,000 legal cases, and meet global litigation challenges. The DuPont experience can teach not only how to manage complex litigation in a global environment but also how to make knowledge management programs succeed in any professional services company. Using electronic document retrieval, knowledge stewards, collaboration, culture change, and leveraging expert know-how, it is possible to realize significant cost savings and to promote revenue generation. See an introduction to the Model and citations to books to guide your organization through the process here.

Posted by Trisha Simonds