Office Overview
The Dallas office of Vinson & Elkins opened in 1986 and has more than 132 lawyers with a wide array of experience in both business and litigation. The Dallas office has developed its practice to include corporate finance and securities, employee benefits and ERISA, financial institutions, health care, insolvency and reorganization, intellectual property and technical litigation, international, Internet and e-commerce, labor and employment, litigation, public finance, real estate, tax, telecommunications and technology. Many of our lawyers having counseling practices in the business areas also handle or assist in litigation and alternative dispute resolution in the context of their specific practices in such areas as employee benefits and ERISA, energy regulation, environmental law, health care and tax. Other lawyers are involved in practices that focus almost exclusively on litigation or dispute resolution, while others combine significant litigation and counseling practices in specific areas. Brief descriptions of our broad range of practice areas are outlined below.
Litigation
General & Business
We represent both business entities and individuals in civil litigation relating to all of the firm's substantive areas. Vinson & Elkins also represents clients in white-collar criminal matters. The civil litigation and white-collar criminal practices of our lawyers involve a broad array of issues, including antitrust, contract, business and securities fraud, constitutional, condemnation, RICO, conspiracy, deceptive trade practice, regulatory compliance, unlawful production and drainage of energy resources, take-or-pay, title, royalty, partition and other energy-related disputes.
Alternative Dispute Resolution
A substantial majority of our litigation lawyers are experienced in representing clients as advocates in alternative dispute resolution (ADR) proceedings. In addition, we have a growing number of lawyers formally trained as third-party neutrals, several of whom spend a significant portion of their time providing mediation and other ADR services in all manners of disputes, including intellectual property, antitrust, bad faith insurance, bankruptcy, toxic waste disposal, pipeline explosion, business fraud and various other personal injury and commercial matters.
Antitrust
We represent clients in all aspects of antitrust and trade regulation matters. We regularly counsel defendants in antitrust disputes, including conspiracies to restrict trade and price-fixing and challenges to distribution practices. On occasion, we also represent plaintiffs in antitrust litigation. In addition to litigation, we have an extensive trade regulation counseling practice, including representation of clients before the Federal Trade Commission, the Department of Justice and state regulators.
Appellate
A specialized area of our litigation practice is appellate work in both federal and state courts, which we undertake for both firm cases and cases handled at trial by other law firms, where we are retained on appeal specifically for our recognized experience in the appellate arena.
Insolvency and Reorganization
We handle matters involving the protection of creditors of bankrupt and near-bankrupt entities before and after bankruptcy filings, and we represent clients in the negotiation of, and litigation related to, reorganization plans and workouts.
Intellectual Property and Technical Litigation
We represent our clients before the Patent and Trademark Office, the U.S. International Trade Commission and other agencies, as well as in the federal and state courts on matters relating to the acquisition, protection and commercial use of trade secrets, patents, trademarks, copyrights and other proprietary information.
Labor & Employment
We regularly counsel public-sector and private employers on the understanding of and compliance with anti-discrimination laws (including EEOC and ADA), as well as on other employer/employee and management/labor issues. We regularly represent our clients in a broad array of labor and employment-issue related litigation, both state and federal. We also help clients resolve litigated and out-of-court disputes, including arbitrations and collective bargaining sessions, with individuals and government entities. Litigated matters have included EEOC class actions, such as age discrimination cases; claims challenging the employment-at-will doctrine; employee pension claims under ERISA; and public-sector civil rights and breach-of-contract claims.
Taxation
We have extensive experience in handling tax controversies, from audit through litigation, before the IRS and various state and local taxing authorities. Our tax controversy practice includes representation of individual and corporate taxpayers, large partnerships and exempt organizations.
Tort and Insurance Defense
Our experience includes personal injury and wrongful death lawsuits involving negligence and products liability; medical, legal, architectural, engineering and other types of professional malpractice; industrial and automobile accidents; and workers' compensation. We also handle libel and slander, false arrest, occupational disease and environmental tort cases.
Business and Finance
General
Our clients include public companies, privately held businesses, individuals, trusts and estates and governmental and quasi-governmental entities. We regularly handle acquisitions and dispositions of businesses and assets; business formations; contract negotiations; project financings; public offerings and private placements of securities; equipment leases, securitizations and other indirect financings; major land development; infrastructure financings; construction contracts; and venture capital financings.
Corporate Finance and Securities
Our Corporate Finance and Securities Practice encompasses all areas involving securities offerings, public companies, stock markets and persons and entities engaged in the business of buying and selling securities and offering investment advice. This Practice also includes mergers, acquisitions and takeovers by means of negotiated transactions, tender offers and proxy contests. In addition, we regularly advise our clients on all aspects of corporate governance, including directors' fiduciary duties and liabilities, shareholders' rights and agreements, special committees of the board of directors and internal investigations. We represent Fortune 500 companies, multinational corporations, publicly traded and privately held businesses, start-up companies, individual entrepreneurs, investment banking firms and investment advisers.
Employee Benefits and ERISA
This broad-based practice covers the entire spectrum of issues encountered by employer sponsors of employee benefit plans and programs, investment managers of plan assets and other fiduciaries and high-level management concerning executive compensation matters. In our work, we represent a diverse group of clients by providing counseling and advocacy on a regular basis in response to an ever-changing tax, regulatory and economic environment.
Energy
Vinson & Elkins has significant experience in virtually all aspects of the energy industry—exploration, production, refining, transportation, power generation, regulation and finance—in all regions of the world. In addition to providing legal advice to the energy industry, we have assisted clients in developing marketing strategies for natural gas, and have developed supply and transportation frameworks for large energy users, including some of the largest generators of power in the United States. Clients include multinational corporations; independent energy, mining and related service companies; institutional, foreign and private investors; multilateral agencies; investment banks; and commercial banks. Our experience includes the purchase, sale and financing of energy assets and pipeline projects; structuring and negotiating energy-related transactions, joint ventures and partnership agreements; energy regulation and legislation; and refinery, petrochemical and cogeneration projects.
Financial Institutions
Our clients include domestic and foreign banks and savings and loan associations, which we represent in major loan transactions and debt restructurings, as well as before the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, Comptroller of the Currency, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and other government agencies on matters relating to regulatory interpretation and compliance, transfers of control and expansions of locations, products and services. We also represent borrowers in dealings and transactions with financial institutions and in devising creative financing proposals for such transactions.
Health Industry
We engage in complex and diverse transactions and projects affecting health care providers, including the organization and development of managed care entities, medical group practices, integrated delivery system and physician-hospital joint venture arrangements; mergers and acquisitions of hospitals and other health care facilities; and representation of hospitals and managed care organizations with respect to operational issues, such as medical staff issues, risk management and licensing surveys and accreditation. One of the largest areas of our Health Practice is third-party reimbursement, including all aspects of the Medicare and Medicaid programs. We also provide legislative and agency representation and evaluations of proposed federal and state regulatory revision. We regularly counsel clients regarding governmental investigations and white collar crime, including Medicare and Medicaid fraud and abuse and other compliance issues.
Insolvency and Reorganization
We regularly represent secured creditors, debtors, creditors' committees and third parties dealing with debtors or financially troubled entities in a myriad of transactions. These transactions generally involve assertion and protection of rights in proceedings under the U.S. Bankruptcy Code; restructuring financial transactions; structuring transactions, such as financing arrangements and acquisitions; litigation involving contract and financial disputes; lender liability issues; and pre- and post-judgment collection matters.
International
We have a substantial International Practice, representing U.S. clients abroad and overseas clients in the United States and elsewhere. Among our non-U.S. clients are governments and wholly or partially government-owned entities. We have worked with clients on a broad range of international commercial transactions involving the acquisition of stock or assets of foreign and domestic companies; project financings; oil and gas exploration and development projects; and international trade regulatory issues. Additionally, we have represented foreign clients in complex lawsuits brought in the United States and in international arbitrations brought both in the United States and abroad.
Internet and E-Commerce
We have represented a large number of clients in various Internet-related projects, ranging from website development to international licenses to initial public offerings. We counsel clients on building a brand, protecting their investment and capitalizing on the rapidly expanding opportunities in the New Economy.
Public Finance
We work with and for public and non-profit entities and represent issuers of tax-exempt and taxable securities sold to finance public improvements; serve as underwriters' counsel in the issuance of tax-exempt and taxable debt sold to finance public and quasi-public improvements; and assist in negotiations with cities, counties and other forms of local government in connection with contracts, franchises, licenses, interlocal agreements, zoning, land development, review and interpretation of rules and regulations. Financings and public projects undertaken by our lawyers include: traditional governmental functions, such as fire protection, water, sewer and drainage systems; public buildings; parks; stadium, theaters and arena construction; jails and prisons; hospitals and health care facilities; power generation and distribution facilities; motor speedways; water parks; visitors and convention centers; cash flow borrowings; libraries; roads, highways and tollways; educational facilities; multi-family and single-family housing projects; ports; and airports. In addition, we represent municipal utility, levee improvement, municipal management, and other forms of special districts, and assist developers in the formation of such districts used to design, construct, develop, operate and maintain commercial and residential developments in and around cities.
Real Estate
We counsel clients on all aspects of commercial, industrial, residential and resort real estate transactions. Our lawyers have represented all facets of the real estate industry, including lenders, equity participants, developers and governmental entities. The Practice includes acquisitions, dispositions, financings, entity formation (joint ventures, limited partnerships, limited liability companies), securitization, leasing, construction contracting and workouts and restructurings.
Taxation
Our Tax Practice spans the breadth of business transactional matters, including advice with respect to federal and Texas state tax matters affecting foreign and domestic enterprises—both publicly and privately held—individuals, tax- exempt entities, governmental and quasi-governmental entities and specially treated entities, such as S corporations and REITs, and the transactions in which they engage. We advise on the tax aspects of mergers, acquisitions, reorganizations, international joint ventures and other transactions and financial instruments; provide counseling on individual income, estate and gift tax matters; create tax-exempt entities; and advise with respect to policy issues related to proposed or new tax laws and favorable interpretations of existing laws. Our goal is always to integrate tax and non-tax advice to achieve favorable tax treatment for our clients, consistent with their commercial objectives.
Telecommunications
Vinson & Elkins participates on a state, federal and international level in the full array of activities involving the telecommunications industry, including rule-making, rate-making, contested cases, administrative appeals, licensing, protection of trade secrets and confidential information, financing and development of corporate structures, taxation, litigation and legislative initiatives. Our lawyers represent numerous established and start-up telecommunications entities on a broad range of technological, transactional and regulatory matters.
Did You Know
Dallas—known to Texans as "Big D"—is a sophisticated, diverse city that's also one of the Southwest's largest, fastest-growing business centers. Whether you are arts-minded or a sports fan, you will find this a fun, exciting town. Our famous professional sports teams include the Dallas Cowboys (NFL), the Stanley Cup Champion Dallas Stars (NHL), the Dallas Mavericks (NBA) and the Texas Rangers (MLB). Dallas is also home to world-class auto racing at Texas Motor Speedway, the second largest sports facility in the U.S. Our city's fine dining scene rivals San Francisco and New York for incredible choices of international fare. V&E;'s offices are located in the downtown Arts District, just across the street from the Dallas Museum of Art and the Meyerson Symphony Center.
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