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Experience

Negotiating Your Real Estate Expansion

When Yards Brewing Company decided to leave its current Delaware River location for a much larger space in bustling Northern Liberties, they called Cozen O’Connor to negotiate the deal.
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Experience

Represented Utz Quality Foods, LLC, the largest privately held snack food company in the United States, in connection with its acquisition of Alabama-based snack food company Golden Enterprises, Inc. The acquisition was financed through an investment in Utz of more than $146 million by private equity firm Metropoulos & Co.

Represented the Vetri Family of Restaurants in connection with its sale to Urban Outfitters Inc. (URBN). Following the sale, Vetri leads a food and beverage division for the global lifestyle retailer, positioning the Vetri Family brands for national growth as part of the Urban Outfitters family.

Represented eMarketer, Inc., a privately held company and the leading aggregator of information on trends in media and technology, in connection with its acquisition by one of the world's largest digital publishers, Axel Springer, in a complex and heavily negotiated reverse merger transaction for a purchase price of approximately $242 million. Represented Sidney Kimmel Entertainment (SKE), a Hollywood-based independent film finance and production company, in its merger with Ivanhoe Entertainment, which has offices in Hong Kong, New York, London, and Singapore.

Represented The Hershey Company in negotiating a lease for its new flagship "Hershey's Chocolate World" store in Times Square, New York City. The new store will be triple the size of Hershey's existing store and located on the ground floor in the 20 Times Square building to be constructed at West 47th Street and Seventh Avenue, Manhattan. The deal includes blade signage and the right to use a significant portion of the state-of-the-art digital billboard display.

Served as lead real estate counsel to Liberty Property Trust in the development of the new Comcast Innovation and Technology Center (CITC), including negotiating the largest single-tenant office lease in the history of Philadelphia. The planned $1.2 billion CITC will include a mixed-use skyscraper (the tallest building in the U.S. outside of New York and Chicago), incorporating more than 1.3 million square feet of office, retail, restaurant, and public space, and topped by a 222-room hotel. The firm negotiated two parallel joint ventures between Liberty Property Trust and Comcast for ownership of the office and the hotel, as well as a series of intermediary entities and ventures, negotiated all documentation for the development of the building, managed land use and zoning such that all necessary permits and approvals were obtained as of right, and structured the transaction for maximum tax efficiency.

Represented Northwestern University in a high-stakes and closely watched appeal before the National Labor Relations Board, defeating the football team’s efforts to form the first-ever union of scholarship student athletes. The case was covered by every major media outlet, and the unprecedented issue spawned Congressional hearings and nation-wide interest.

Represented GoDaddy in a $30 million, “bet-the-industry” cybersquatting action garnering national media attention.

Won summary judgment on behalf of Marriott International in a multimillion-dollar wrongful death lawsuit brought by the family of a man who died when a suicide bomber drove into a Marriott hotel in Pakistan. We successfully argued that, under the operative franchise agreement, the franchisee was responsible (under either U.S. or Pakistani law) for handling all security measures at the hotel. This result was affirmed on appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit.

Represented a shareholder in a dispute involving more than $100 million in connection with the sale of multiple franchised locations, in which an adverse shareholder attempted to purchase our client's interest and stop the sale. After a two-week bench trial, we obtained an order in our client's favor that required the sale to proceed and allowed our client to retain a minority interest in the business and to serve as a senior executive in the new entity.

Successfully obtained a jury verdict in our client’s favor in the World Trade Center insurance coverage litigation involving Silverstein Properties. The litigation involved a dispute as to whether the 9/11 attack was a single occurrence or two separate occurrences. At stake were $3.5 billion (single occurrence) and $7 billion (multiple occurrences).

Represented a consortium of 16 insurers with more than $400 million in paid claims and reserves in litigation arising out of catastrophic Southern California wildfires that destroyed thousands of homes. The principal defendant was San Diego Gas & Electric, which was responsible for maintaining its high-voltage power lines so as to prevent electrical failures and ensuing fires. The wildfires were caused by arcing of the electrical lines that resulted from their improper maintenance and from subsequent contact with brush and other combustible materials.

Represented the interest of Del Monte Foods, one of a number of named defendants in a multi-district litigation wherein it was alleged that certain pet food was contaminated and improperly labeled. The plaintiffs and defendants in these multi-district litigation cases, including the five consolidated cases in which Del Monte was a defendant, agreed to a settlement of the class action suits, which involved both U.S. and Canadian claims. Our client’s portion of contribution to this settlement was less than 2 percent of the total settlement.

Represented Pennsylvania American Water Company with respect to regulatory and real estate matters in connection with its $195 million acquisition of the wastewater system assets of the Scranton Sewer Authority. The transaction represents one of the largest wastewater acquisitions in the company's history and required a complex regulatory approval process by the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission, among other governmental agencies, including a finding of commission jurisdiction over combined sanitary and stormwater wastewater services.

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