Practice Areas

Commercial Litigation

Howard Rice has a national reputation for excellence in high stakes, complex litigation. Our litigation practice runs the gamut from securities and consumer class action and unfair competition cases, to intellectual property disputes (including trademark, patent, copyright, trade dress and trade secret disputes), to labor and employment disputes, to product liability cases, to real estate and other commercial disputes. Our attorneys represent clients in various industries, including sports, technology, health care, media, investment funds, banking, real estate, insurance and securities.

No one litigation strategy fits every case. So at Howard Rice, we pride ourselves on designing strategies that make sense for the particular client and matter. For example, wherever appropriate, we craft pretrial dispositive motions designed to avoid the high cost of discovery and trial altogether. Positioning a case for mediation and advantageous settlement is also an important part of our overall approach to litigation. Some matters, of course, do not settle and cannot be resolved by dispositive motions. In that event, we have an outstanding record of winning at trial.

Our firm's appellate practice is one of the premier practices in the nation, and we are frequently called upon to handle appeals of cases that were tried at the trial court level by other firms.

Areas of Focus
  • Antitrust
  • Securities and broker-dealer
  • Bankruptcy and reorganization
  • Appellate
  • Intellectual property
  • Product liability
  • Unfair competition and unfair business practices
  • Consumer class action defense
  • Employment disputes
  • Public entities
  • Banking
  • Business disputes
  • Corporate and partnership dissolution
  • High-net-worth marital dissolution
  • Disputes relating to mergers and acquisitions
  • Administrative law
  • International business disputes

Representative Engagement

When Kmart Corporation was sued in California state court, it turned to Howard Rice. The suit alleged unfair competition and other consumer claims arising out of the company's allegedly widespread, if unintentional, overcharging of customers at the checkout counter. Plaintiffs sought damages for themselves and a class of customers and restitution on behalf of the general public in excess of $30 million. We designed a strategy to systematically knock the legs out from underneath the plaintiffs' claims. In pretrial motions, the firm persuaded the court to deny class certification outright and to limit the Section 17200 claim in certain material respects. At the close of the plaintiffs' case at trial, we moved for judgment in favor of the company, arguing that, given the factual stipulations and evidence brought to light in the cross-examination of plaintiffs' own expert, plaintiffs' statistical case was so flawed that the company should not even have to present its own countervailing evidence. This motion, too, was granted and judgment was entered in favor of our client, dismissing the remaining claims in their entirety and awarding our client its costs of the suit.

Representative Clients

  • Adaptec, Inc.
  • Ariba, Inc.
  • Charles Schwab Corporation
  • Citigroup Global Markets
  • CMP Media, LLC
  • Gensler
  • Hartford Accident and Indemnity Company
  • Hewlett-Packard Company
  • Longs Drug Stores
  • Major League Baseball Properties
  • Manulife Financial
  • Morgan Stanley
  • The Oakland Raiders
  • Pacific Gas and Electric Company
  • Pacific Maritime Association
  • PalmSource, Inc. (now ACCESS Systems Americas, Inc.)
  • PC World Communications, Inc.
  • Recology (formerly Norcal Waste Systems)
  • Saul Zaentz Company
  • Technology Crossover Ventures
  • U.S. Olympic Committee
  • Vivendi Universal Games, Inc.
  • Wells Fargo & Company

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