With many companies going through financial trouble, there is a fear among licensees that they will lose their right to use licensed intellectual property ("IP") if the licensor becomes insolvent and wants to restructure. Up until now there has been much uncertainty in the common law as to whether an insolvent debtor may disclaim an IP licence agreement in a restructuring.
Scottish Lion Insurance Company is attempting for the second time to promote a solvent scheme of arrangement to bring its insurance business to an early close. The first attempt was abandoned in 2005 when the company was ordered by the Scottish Court to disclose to one objecting creditor a list of all its scheme creditors, whereupon the proposed scheme was withdrawn.
The United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of New Jersey denied fourteen plans of reorganization filed by Congoleum Corporation before the court finally dismissed the case on February 27, 2009. While the Congoleum bankruptcy proceedings involve numerous issues, this article focuses generally on insurer standing and specifically, on whether Congoleum’s insurers had standing to object to Congoleum’s twelfth plan of reorganization.
In a judgment handed down last week, the Court of Appeal upheld the decision of Mr Justice Blackburne (previously reported here) that the English courts have no jurisdiction to sanction the proposed scheme of arrangement for Lehman Brothers International Europe (LBIE) insofar as it purports to extinguish rights of beneficiaries under trusts.
Caisse Populaire Desjardins de l’Est de Drummond v. Canada, 2009 SCC 29
Following up on our previous blog on Lord Glennie's controversial decision in the Scottish Lion solvent scheme of arrangement we can now report that last week the scheme was formally dismissed.
Ernst & Young ("E&Y") has settled the Akai Holdings ("Akai") case with Akai’s liquidator, Borrelli Walsh. In this case, E&Y was accused of negligence for failing to avert Akai’s collapse in 2004.
E&Y had been Akai’s auditor prior to the collapse, which remains Hong Kong’s biggest ever insolvency. The terms of the settlement are confidential.
On 24 September 2009, the South China Morning Post reported that new evidence had come to light which suggested that E&Y’s staff had tampered with or faked hundreds of documents relating to its audit of Akai.
On September 18, 2009, long-awaited amendments to the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act (“BIA”) and the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act (“CCAA”) take effect that will have a significant impact on commercial insolvencies in Canada. While many of these changes reflect existing practice and case law, some introduce more novel concepts not developed by courts, broadening what can be accomplished under the insolvency regime. This article comments on salient features of the new amendments.
Long-awaited amendments to Canada’s insolvency legislation came into force on September 18, 2009. The amendments materially reform both of Canada’s major insolvency statutes: the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act (the “BIA”) and the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act (the “CCAA”). To a considerable degree the amendments codify 15 years of case law developments, but with modifications that could prove to be material in the next few years.
On August 28, 2009, Delta Financial Corp. (“Delta”) filed a Notice of Appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit seeking to overturn the dismissal of its coverage action against Westchester Surplus Lines Insurance Co. (“Westchester”) and United States Fire Insurance Co. (“USFI”). The coverage action, which was filed as a part of an adversary proceeding with the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware, sought coverage under two D&O policies issued by Westchester and USFI respectively.