The Oil & Gas Journal will present its annual Midyear Forecast, a special report that uses first-half data to update projections that appeared in OGJ’s Annual Forecast and Review this past January.

The webinar will be on Friday, July 10, at 10 a.m. Central time.

Both reports project oil and gas markets through the end of the year worldwide, analyze demand product by product in the United States, and forecast drilling activity in the United States and Canada. The webcast also will discuss political developments important to the oil and gas industry.

Presenters will be OGJ Editor Bob Tippee and Senior Economics Editor Conglin Xu. They will summarize projections in key categories, note important changes from January’s forecasts, and examine reasons for the adjustments.

Register for the webinar.

Some of the most boilerplate-looking provisions in contracts are often the most onerous, writes Josh M. Leavitt of Much Shelist, P.C.

He gives an example of how indemnity clauses qualify: an indemnifying party (such as a contractor) could find itself owing the indemnified party (such as an owner and its architect) substantial reimbursements and defense costs (including even provision of an attorney) for the defense of third-party claims (such as the claim of a supplier). “This could happen where the indemnifying party (the contractor) was only alleged to have been partially at fault — and even where the contractor may not have been at fault at all.”

He writes that it is important for indemnitors (those giving indemnity rights) and indemnitees (those receiving indemnity rights) to understand the risks involved with these clauses.

Read the white paper.

Mintz Levin has published an article on the proper approach to hiring and negotiation of an employment contract.

The article, written by Jennifer Rubin, points out the similarities between divorce law and employment practice. “Two parties meet (the interview), they realize how many things they have in common (the job requirements and qualifications), and then they fall in love and get married (the job offer and acceptance).”

“There is no doubt that the best time to negotiate the employment terms that are key to a termination is before you ‘walk down the aisle’,” she writes. “While it might seem both counterintuitive, counterproductive and even unromantic to focus on the end of the relationship at the beginning, it is just good business to be practical about a relationship’s end.”

Read the article.

The standards for walkway safety have changed – and the way slip and fall lawsuits are going to change with them, reports The Expert Institute.

The Institute has produced a white paper that outlines crucial updates made by the (ANSI) B101 committee on safety requirements for slip, trip, and fall requirements, and how they will impact defendant liability in more than half of all slip and fall claims.

The information in this whitepaper will help readers:

• Use new testing standards to prove defendant liability
• Select better slip and fall cases
• Understand how these new standards will affect your practice

Download the white paper.

National law firm Wilson Elser announces that Jeffrey C. Hart has joined the firm’s Detroit Metro office in Livonia, Michigan, as of counsel. Prior to joining Wilson Elser, Hart was of counsel with Segal McCambridge Singer & Mahoney.

Hart litigates employment, complex commercial, product liability, medical malpractice, transportation, general liability, professional liability and workers’ compensation matters.

An accomplished attorney with more than 280 cases tried before various administrative agencies, judges and juries, Hart represents Fortune 500 companies, cities, universities, hospitals, physicians groups and individuals in civil and criminal matters.

“Jeff is a welcome addition to our Metro Detroit office,” said John Eads, regional managing partner of the office, in a release. “His experience representing clients across a broad spectrum of practices and industries adds tremendous value to the counsel we provide our clients and to our office – one of the firm’s newest. The clients who accompany Jeff will benefit from his role as their one point of contact for Wilson Elser’s national, full-service platform.”

Hart believes in staying abreast of the most recent developments in the legal sector and is affiliated with several bar associations, including the American Bar Association, DRI: The Voice of the Defense Bar and the State Bar of Michigan, and maintains memberships on numerous committees within each group.

Committed to pro bono service, Hart volunteers with the Homeless Experience Legal Protection (H.E.L.P), a program offered through Sts. Peter and Paul Jesuit Church’s Warming Center that assists homeless men and women with legal issues.

Hart earned his B.A. degree from Michigan State University (1992) and his J.D. degree from Loyola University Chicago School of Law (1995), where he served on the editorial board for the Loyola Consumer Law Reporter and on the advisory board for the publication’s predecessor, Loyola Consumer Law Review.

About Wilson Elser

Wilson Elser, a full-service and leading defense litigation law firm (www.wilsonelser.com), serves its clients with nearly 800 attorneys in 27 offices in the United States and one in London and through a network of affiliates in key regions globally. Founded in 1978, it ranks among the top 200 law firms identified by The American Lawyer and is included in the top 50 of The National Law Journal’s survey of the nation’s largest law firms. Wilson Elser serves a growing, loyal base of clients with innovative thinking and an in-depth understanding of their respective businesses.

Bridgeway Software is making available copies of its first ever, in-house, matter management and e-billing buyers’ guide.

The ebook, vetted by seasoned, in-house professionals, is designed to offer a framework for legal departments to:

• Understand matter management and e-billing systems and their uses/benefits
• Conduct an internal analysis and define requirements
• Develop goals for a software solution, and prepare for adoption
• Evaluate vendors, the functionality of their systems, and the requirements for implementation
• Select a vendor based on the fitness of the solution, the likelihood of a viable, long-term relationship, and key points of differentiation

Download the free guide.

The Houston trial law firm Ahmad, Zavitsanos, Anaipakos, Alavi & Mensing P.C., or AZA, again has earned recognition among the nation’s top commercial litigation firms in the 2015 edition of Chambers USA: America’s Leading Lawyers for Business.

In its Chambers USA profile, AZA is described by one client as a “very results-driven law firm, and the results they’ve given us are outstanding.” AZA attorneys also were called “highly skilled trial lawyers and litigators who are prepared to go to trial.”

In addition to the firm’s Chambers USA ranking, AZA partners Demetrios Anaipakos, John Zavitsanos andTodd Mensing received individual honors among the leading commercial litigators in the country. All three are nationally recognized trial lawyers who handle bet-the-company litigation.

Read the whole story.

The Illinois Appellate Court tackled one of the most misunderstood issues in the commercial general liability policy: Does an obligation to indemnify trigger insurance coverage? The National Law Review reported on the ruling, writing that, although the facts in Bituminous Casualty Corporation v. Plano Molding Company are not typical for most general liability disputes, the analysis and reasoning of the court are helpful in understanding this pesky part of the policy.

“At issue was a clause in a bill of lading issued by Plano, a manufacturer of storage boxes, in which it agreed to indemnify K-Line, a railroad carrier who was shipping the merchandise, ‘for any injury, loss or damage caused by breach of warranty’ that the cargo being shipped was ‘safe and proper and suitable for handling and carriage,” the report explains.

The court found that “because defendant (the Insured) is liable only for its own breach of warranty, it has not assumed liability for K-Line’s negligence.”

Read the report.

The national law firm of Quarles & Brady LLP has achieved Gold Standard Re-Certification by the Women in Law Empowerment Forum (WILEF) for the fifth consecutive year. Forty-four firms are included on this year’s list.

“Our five-peat certification reaffirms that women at Quarles & Brady are in the highest leadership roles and have achieved successful and respected careers at the firm,” said Janine M. Landow-Esser, chair of the firm’s Diversity Committee. “We couldn’t be more thrilled to receive the WILEF certification for the fifth year in a row.”

Gold Standard Certification emphasizes the leadership roles achieved by women partners, rather than the policies or practices of the firm or the overall number or percentage of women in the partnership. Law firms with 300 or more practicing lawyers in the United States were eligible if they successfully demonstrated that women represented a meaningful percentage of their equity partners, of their highest leadership positions, of their governance and compensation committees, and of their most highly compensated partners. To be certified, firms had to meet at least four of the six criteria:

• Women account for at least 20 percent of equity partners or, alternatively, 33 percent or more of the attorneys becoming equity partners during the past twelve months.
• Women represent at least 10 percent of firm chairs and office managing partners.
• Women make up at least 20 percent of the firm’s primary governance committee.
• Women represent 20 percent or more of the firm’s compensation committee.
• Women make up at least 25 percent of practice group leaders or department heads.
• Women represent at least 10 percent of the top half of the most highly compensated partners.

About WILEF
Founded in 1997 by Elizabeth Anne “Betiayn” Tursi, with the support of R.R. Donnelley and several successful senior women attorneys, and subsequently of law firm and corporate sponsors, WILEF is dedicated to assisting women in law to assume leadership roles within the NLJ 250 and Fortune 1000 legal departments and within their respective communities. WILEF presents cutting edge programming that provides an educational and networking forum for women in law.

About Quarles & Brady LLP
Quarles & Brady is a full-service AmLaw 200 law firm with more than 475 attorneys offering an array of legal services to corporate and individual clients that range from small entrepreneurial businesses to Fortune 100 companies, with practice focuses in health care and life sciences, business law, data privacy and security, and complex litigation. The firm has offices in Chicago; Indianapolis; Madison; Milwaukee; Naples, Florida; Phoenix; Scottsdale; Tampa; Tucson; and Washington, D.C. Additional information can be found online at quarles.com, as well as on Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook.

Scott & Scott will present a complimentary webinar discussing traditional and newly developed software licensing models, principal concerns about current licensing models, types of license agreements, and primary causes of exposure in enterprise-level software audits.

The webinar will be Tuesday, June 30, beginning at 11 a.m. Central time.

Software licensing options for large enterprises have evolved substantially over the past several years. Businesses today have more options and flexibility to meet their software needs, Scott & Scott says. However, with that flexibility often comes complex software asset management (SAM) obligations. Licensing models that were previously unavailable absent extensive negotiations are now regularly offered. IT teams must equip themselves to recognize the unique challenges involved with the various options in order to avoid unnecessary licensing exposure.

In this presentation attendees will learn:

• Differences between traditional and newly developed licensing models
• How to handle principal concerns with current licensing models
• Types of license agreements
• How to reduce exposure in enterprise-level software audits
• Challenges to SAM caused by new licensing model

Register for the webinar.

Matthew L. Simmons has joined Coats Rose as an associate in the firm’s Commercial Litigation practice group in the Houston office.

Simmons’ practice focuses on complex commercial and construction litigation. He counsels clients on the broad range of issues related to commercial litigation, trade secrets and employment disputes. His practice includes significant representations in Federal and State Court.

Prior to joining Coats Rose, Simmons was an associate at an AmLaw 10 firm. He received the CALI Award for Legal Practice 1, and the Jurisprudence Award for contracts, NAFTA, and Public International Law while at the Texas Tech University School of Law.

Coats Rose is a business transaction and litigation law firm based in Houston, Texas. For more than 25 years, Coats Rose attorneys have worked with clients in construction/surety law, real estate law, commercial litigation of all types, municipal law, public finance, affordable housing, insurance law, labor and employment law, and governmental relations. Coats Rose is comprised of more than 90 attorneys, with offices in Houston, Austin, Dallas, San Antonio, and New Orleans.

The Government Affairs Practice Group at Gardere Wynne Sewell LLP has once again topped the Texas Lawyer Lobbying Scorecard after representing more clients and reporting more compensation than any other firm in the state during the 84th Texas Legislature.

To compile its lobbying scorecard, the newspaper’s editors reviewed the legislative results for 12 of the state’s busiest law firm lobby shops.

During the regular session, which began on Jan. 13 and ended on June 1, Gardere’s lobbying group represented a total of 90 clients. This is an increase from the 60 clients the firm represented during the 2013 session and almost double the number of clients represented by any other firm, the firm said in a release.

Read the whole story.

Ahmad, Zavitsanos, Anaipakos, Alavi & Mensing P.C., or AZA, is recommended as one of the top seven U.S. plaintiff patent firms by the London-based intellectual property magazine Intellectual Asset Management (IAM).

The magazine’s guide to the world’s top patent lawyers in key jurisdictions also named AZA partner Amir Alavi a silver-level recommended Texas patent litigator. Alavi was hailed for his work in the record-breaking case Versata Software Inc. v. SAP America Inc.

“Amir Alavi, who played a lead role on the matter, is one of those guys who, without huge troops of people working for him, gets a lot done and carves out big wins. He is extremely smooth and capable in court,” says the IAM Patent 1000 2015 – The World’s Leading Patent Professionals.

Read the whole story.

Trial lawyer Mark Lanier of Houston-based The Lanier Law Firm will be recognized with the Lifetime Achievement Award by the American Association for Justice (AAJ) at the organization’s annual convention on July 14, 2015.

The Lifetime Achievement Award recognizes an AAJ member of at least 20 years standing whose courtroom advocacy has powerfully advanced the rights of the wrongfully injured and who has significantly furthered the cause of justice and the mission of the Association.

The Washington, D.C.-based AAJ is the world’s largest trial bar, providing trial attorneys with information, professional support and a nationwide network that promotes a fair and effective justice system.

“To receive this award, the highest given by the AAJ, is a true milestone in my career,” says Mr. Lanier. “My ongoing commitment, and the commitment of every attorney in this firm, is to uphold the AAJ’s mission and to ensure that any person who is injured by the misconduct or negligence of others can obtain justice.”

Read the whole story.

3M has announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Capital Safety from KKR for a total enterprise value of $2.5 billion, including the assumption of approximately $0.7 billion of debt, net of cash acquired.

Capital Safety is a leading global provider of fall protection equipment, one of the fastest-growing safety categories within the global personal protective equipment industry.

The personal protective equipment industry is a strategic priority for 3M, the company said in a release. Demand for personal protective equipment is rapidly growing, driven by increasing regulatory focus on worker safety across both developed and developing countries.

Capital Safety’s industry-leading products and solutions include harnesses, lanyards, self-retracting lifelines and engineered systems sold under well-known global brands DBI-SALA and PROTECTA. The company has demonstrated strong and consistent growth with sales increasing at a compound annual growth rate of 10 percent over the past four years. The company’s sales, adjusted to include recent acquisitions on a full-year basis, were approximately $430 million for its fiscal year ended March 31, 2015.

Latham & Watkins represents KKR in its sale of Capital Safety to 3M with a corporate deal team led from the firm’s New York office by partner Jennifer Perkins, with New York associate Samuel Powers and Chicago associate Jonathan Solomon; on tax matters by New York partner David Raab, with associate Matthew Dewitz; on benefits matters by Washington D.C. partner Adam Kestenbaum, with Washington D.C. associate Marysia Mullen and New York associate Lori Goodman; on antitrust matters by Washington D.C. partner Marc Williamson, Brussels partner Hector Armengod, with Washington D.C. associate Mitchell London; on intellectual property matters by New York partner Jeffrey Tochner; on environmental matters by Washington D.C. partner James Barrett; and on UK legal matters by London associates Farah O’Brien and Daniel Treloar.

eTERA Consulting, an internationally recognized and award-winning leader in data and technology management, announced that Cyber Crime Forensics has joined the company’s highly successful All1ance One Partner Program. The All1ance One Partner Program provides many ways for business partners to expand their business, win more clients and increase revenue by offering their clients a full range of eDiscovery services throughout the Electronic Discovery Reference Model (“EDRM”).

“The strategic partnership we have created with eTERA Consulting allows Cyber Crime Forensics to offer a full range of services with an internationally recognized data and technology management company,” said Richard Plummer, CEO of Cyber Crime Forensics. “We look forward to teaming up with eTERA Consulting to allow our clients to significantly reduce the cost of eDiscovery services across the EDRM. This will certainly be a win-win for all involved and we look forward to being part of the eTERA team!”

“We are very excited to have Rich and his team as part of the All1ance One Partner Program,” said Mary McGinness, eTERA’s All1ance One Manager. “Rich has great knowledge in the forensics space, and brings a passion and drive for client relations that the entire eTERA team can relate to. Rich, who is based in California, has experience in conducting collection and preservation for eDiscovery, incident response, computer forensics and mobile device forensics investigations. As an All1ance One Partner, Rich’s unique background, along with his west coast network, will be very beneficial to eTERA’s strategic growth.”

Read the full report.

The U.S. branch of a China-based company was hit with $31.5 million patent infringement verdict, reports the Southeast Texas Record.

The plaintiff DataQuill, sued ZTE Corp. and its U.S. subsidiary in 2013 in the U.S. District Court for Eastern Texas, Marshall Division.

Nearly two years later, a Texas federal jury found ZTE USA infringed on two of the company’s patents, awarding $31.5 million in damages, court records show.

Read the article.

The parents of a community college student who went into a coma and died after a diagnostic test at Phelps Memorial Hospital Center in New York State have reached an $18.1 million settlement with the hospital and doctor who treated their daughter.

A report in lohud.com, a Gannett company, said Raina Ferraro, 19, had an endoscopy, in which a hollow tube is inserted into the body, usually through the mouth, at Phelps in January 2013 after experiencing stomach pain.

During the procedure, the patient went into cardiac and respiratory arrest. She died in May after more than two years in a vegetative state.

Her parents were represented by attorney Sanford Rubenstein.

Read the article.

A paper published recently by Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner discusses a court decision that may have implications for enforcing settlement agreements in litigations when the other party tries to renounce.

“A plaintiff executed a settlement agreement received from the defendants, but later asserted that its acceptance of the agreement was contingent upon the defendants’ execution of the settlement by a specified deadline,” authors of the Finnegan paper explain. “Even though the defendants failed to sign by the deadline, the court enforced the agreement, finding that the signing deadline was not a material term of the settlement.”

The case is Adaptix, Inc. v. ASUStek Computer Inc., in which the plaintiff, Adaptix, executed a settlement agreement received from defendants ASUStek Computer Inc. and Asus Computer International, but later asserted that its acceptance of the agreement was contingent on ASUS’s execution of the settlement agreement by a specified date.

Read the paper.

Many people believe that having a contract with Chinese companies is a waste of time and money because “everyone knows” that China never enforces contracts, writes Dan Harris in a posting on Above the Law.

But there are three reasons why it makes sense to have a contract with your Chinese counterparty, and only one of those reasons is enforceability, he explains.

One reason is to assure that the Chinese company with which you are doing business truly understands what you want of it, he writes. Another reason for having a well-written Chinese language contract with your Chinese counterparty is to convince it that it will be better off complying with your contract than violating it. And the third reason is enforceability.

Read the article.