Automotive

Jenner & Block attorneys have decades of experience counseling clients in the automotive and related industries in a wide variety of litigation, transactional, regulatory and other matters. We represent clients in all areas of the automotive industry, including vehicle manufacturers, parts suppliers and private equity firms investing in automotive companies.

LITIGATION PRACTICES

• Product Liability. We have considerable experience defending a broad array of matters for automotive companies, including claims of defects with regard to air bags, seat belts, brake performance, exhaust system performance, electronic components, rollover, roof crush and general crashworthiness of vehicles. Additionally, we counsel clients to reduce the risk of liability and develop cost effective recall plans when faced with defective products.
• Class Action. We have handled dozens of consumer class action lawsuits alleging fraud and breach of warranty claims on behalf of automotive industry clients and Fortune 500 companies. We have successfully moved to dismiss complaints, obtained denials of class certification, and entered into highly favorable settlements. We emphasize early strategic thinking in our class action cases to minimize legal fees and obtain the best business result for our clients.
• Patent Litigation and Counseling. We litigate patent cases for our automotive clients in courts across the country with creativity, strong technical credentials and extensive trial experience. Partners in our patent litigation practice have tried a variety of matters, averaging more than 10 cases each, to juries, courts or arbitrators.
• Complex Commercial Litigation. While we regularly handle significant defense work for major U.S. and foreign companies, our attorneys also have achieved immense success representing companies as plaintiffs in complex commercial business disputes. The American Lawyer previously selected us as one of the top five litigation departments in the United States. Citing our impressive victories for Fortune 500 clients, the magazine singled out Jenner & Block for our “astonishing” trial results and “hard fought” settlements.

TRANSACTIONAL PRACTICES

• Mergers and Acquisitions. Our mergers and acquisitions attorneys regularly represent automotive companies and other parties in all types of domestic and cross-border M&A activities, including acquisitions, divestitures, joint ventures, spin-offs, MBOs, LBOs, going-private transactions and reorganizations.
• Securities and Corporate Finance. We have extensive experience in a wide variety of securities transactions and counseling matters for companies in the automotive and related industries, ranging from small private placements to large debt offerings and the largest public offerings of all time, and in connection with the securities law aspects of merger and acquisition transactions and tender and exchange offers.
• Real Estate. We regularly represent our automotive and other corporate clients with all aspects of their real estate needs, including the acquisition, development, leasing, financing and construction of manufacturing facilities, warehouses and headquarters facilities, office buildings and retail.

COUNSELING

• Confidential investigations into company practices and other regulatory matters
• Regulatory compliance, including Dealers’ Day in Court and Lemon Law compliance and defense
• Corporate governance
• Labor, employment and employee benefits law
• Tax, including cross-border tax counseling and the evaluation of projects and contractual arrangements in regard to transfer pricing issues
• Intellectual property law
• Insurance law and counseling, representing policyholders in connection with claims and disputes with insurers
• Environmental and workplace health and safety law
• Antitrust and competition law
• Government contracts law

REPRESENTATIVE AUTOMOTIVE CLIENTS

• General Motors
• Nissan North America, Inc.
• General Dynamics
• HHI Group Holdings
• Tenneco
• Volvo Trucks North America
• Meter S.p.A.
• Hertz Corporation
• Lotus Cars Ltd.
• Motorola, Inc.
• Mitsubishi Electric
• Cummins Westport