Manufacturing
The United States is experiencing a manufacturing renaissance with activity centered on the development of a lean, advanced manufacturing sector enhanced by evolving efficiencies and a drive to improve sustainability. Economic activity and employment growth continue to rise in the manufacturing industry with manufacturers contributing $2.37 trillion to the economy in 2019, according to the National Association of Manufacturers. Stites & Harbison's manufacturing attorneys represent manufacturers in many industry sectors and stand ready to assist in providing needed legal services.
Our clients include some of the world’s leading manufacturing companies including the pharmaceutical, construction materials, metals, medical device, chemical, energy generation, transportation, automotive, food and beverage and technology industries.
We have represented manufacturers throughout the United States in their diverse needs for decades and often counsel management on legal matters including:
- Mergers and acquisitions
- Due diligence
- Commercial contracts
- Intellectual property and technology
- Facility construction, expansion and relocation
- Corporate transactions and financing
- Employee benefits, pensions and executive and incentive compensation
- Employment and labor relations
- Environmental compliance, permitting and enforcement
- Brownfield re-development
- Sustainability and “Green” certifications
- Litigation and dispute resolution
- Affirmative Action
- Real estate
- Restructuring
- Tax
Whether our clients face a regulatory problem, workforce issue, or unique growth opportunity, we take time to listen and understand our clients’ business. From that initial platform, we work to identify the issues concerning and impacting our manufacturing clients. Our manufacturing attorneys keep up with current and evolving legal issues in their fields and bring that base of information to each representation. Using a multidisciplinary approach to providing legal services allows the manufacturing lawyers of Stites & Harbison to deliver manufacturing companies with sophisticated, seamless and comprehensive counsel in this evolving and growing segment of our economy.
Retirement Plans: How to Guard Against Fiduciary Liability
In recent years, we have seen more and more ERISA class action claims against retirement plan sponsors and committees for breach of fiduciary duty. In the past, such claims were generally only made against very large plans but we are starting to see claims against smaller plans. The primary allegation is often that the fiduciaries failed to seek the lowest fees available or put another way the fiduciaries were “asleep at the wheel.” By one report, 463 lawsuits have been filed over the last eight years claiming fiduciaries failed to obtain the lowest available fees. Lexington office attorney Andy Jacobs takes a look at the issues in this Stites & Harbison Client Alert.