Legal news and trends for Canadian in-house counsel and c-suite executives
Issue link: https://digital.canadianlawyermag.com/i/50887
INCLOSING Our roundup of interesting trends and what's going on in legal departments SEEN&HEARD Transmeta sued over GC's $10M Bonus and other Transmeta executives and board members for breach of fiduciary duty, gross mismanagement, waste of corporate assets, and abuse of control. "In this era of people taking a hard look at executive How much is too much? Activist hedge fund says Transmeta Corp's $10-million contingency-style bonus was just too much to give an in-house lawyer, according to a lawsuit filed by Riley Investment Management. The Santa Clara, Calif. Chip-licensing company agreed to give its general counsel, John O'Hara Horsley, a large cut of a $250-million settlement reached with Intel Corp. late last year. The lawsuit says the bonus is worth more than $10 mil- lion and calls it "outrageous, illegal, and unconscionable," reports The Reporter. Riley Investment, which owns about seven per cent of the company and earlier this year made an offer to buy Trans- meta, filed the derivative suit on Jan. 31. It targets Horsley First criminal conviction for OH&S offence Three years after the federal government introduced amendments to the "organizations" of the offence of criminal negligence for workplace safety viola- tions — the first corporate conviction is making its way through the system. Late last year, Transpave Inc. pleaded guilty to criminal negligence charges Legal Post's blog. Birer told the Financial Post Moves & shakes McInnes Cooper, known as Atlantic Canada's law firm, is pleased to announce that John Roberts, formerly general coun- sel of the Irving Group in Moncton, is joining the firm as an associate in the corporate finance and corporate and business transactions group. McInnes Cooper serves clients from six of- fices — Halifax, Moncton, St. John's, Fredericton, Saint John, and Charlottetown — and Roberts will be working out of both the Moncton and Halifax offices over the next few months. 38 APRIL 2008 C ANADIAN Lawyer INHOUSE a team of 400+ lawyers based in Mumbai and Punei, who are trained in common law prin- ciples. Birer says the work can include litigation and corporate-commercial services — legal research, document review and drafting, contract management, lease abstracting, and due diligence. "It's the lower end of the legal spectrum," he tells FP. IH compensation, we view this to be a particularly egregious example of a board and its officers looking out just for themselves," said Peter Stone, the Paul Hastings Janofsky & Walker LLP partner representing Riley Investment. Transmeta justifies the unusual bonus arrangement in the January regulatory filing, explaining that instead of paying outside counsel to manage the case on a contingency basis, it would give that incentive to Horsley. The company did use an outside law firm, Ropes & Gray LLP, to litigate the Intel case, and Riley Investment said it believes that Transmeta paid the law firm millions of dollars on a non-contingent basis. Stone said Transmeta shouldn't characterize the bonus as a contingency fee, because "none of the officers paid bo- nuses had any risk." Aside from Horsley, the lawsuit says, two other Transmeta execs took excessive cash bonuses worth $1.2 million after the Intel settlement. Outsourcing goes inside Newly launched Legalwise's mandate is simple: to significantly reduce your legal costs and improve your turnaround times on legal work, through offshore legal outsourcing. Legalwise is a Canadian outsourcing firm that uses lawyers from the Asian subcontinent to carry out assignments under the guidance of Canadian lawyers. Headed up by Toronto lawyer Gavin Birer, Legalwise claims to offer a