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Derek Lipscombe, Alex Pratt Join Haynes Boone’s Labor & Employment Practice - Derek Lipscombe was managing counsel at Toyota North America for nearly 11 years, and before that he spent four years as senior managing counsel at J.C. Penney. Alex Pratt practiced law at Perkins Coie for nine years. This week, both lawyers joined the Dallas office of Haynes Boone as partners in its expanding labor and employment practice.

Legal industry analysts say the lateral hires give the Dallas-based corporate firm a distinct advantage in the labor side of the employment law practice — an expertise that they describe as often overlooked yet in demand. September 9, 2026Mark Curriden
Biz Court Jury Sides with Deposition Video Producer in Fight with Ex-Business Partner - SmartDisk, a deposition video and production company that started in Houston more than 20 years ago, was vindicated by a panel of Texas Business Court jurors Tuesday afternoon when they agreed a former business partner owes the company about $6.4 million in damages for breach of an agreement.  September 8, 2026Michelle Casady
Four Former McKool Smith Principals Open High-Stakes IP Firm - Intellectual property lawyers Joshua Budwin, Richard Kamprath, Kevin Burgess, and John Campbell are bringing a new boutique powered by Big Law veterans to the market. “I tell my kids if you want to be truly successful you’ve got to work for yourself," Budwin said. September 8, 2026Brooks Igo
CDT Roundup: $17B End to the Slog Days of Summer - A summer's end dearth of deals seems to have ended last week with 12 M&A transactions valued at $17 billion reported — though no CapM deals for the second week in a row. September 6, 2026Jason Philyaw
Flex Acquires EPC Power for $4.4B - Freshfields and Vinson & Elkins advised on the transaction that Flex says will allow its data center development unit to capitalize on the next generation of power architectures required for artificial intelligence. An IPO is likely to follow in Q1 2027, following the deal's close. September 6, 2026Jason Philyaw
New Courthouse Coming to College Station - Congress passed the Local Access to Courts Act this week, creating a new federal courthouse in College Station as part of the Houston Division in the Southern District of Texas. U.S. District Chief Judge Randy Crane will select temporary quarters and then look at a location likely around Texas A&M to construct a new courthouse, which can take two years. September 4, 2026Alexa Shrake

Centerpiece

Litigation Roundup: Divided Panel Vacates Magistrate Referral in $125M Port Dispute  - In this edition of Litigation Roundup, we offer details on two high-dollar disputes involving the leasing of railcars, the former chief financial officer of a Dallas nonprofit goes to prison for embezzling $2 million, and the parties that lost a patent case seeking more than $400 million in damages ask for a redo.  September 8, 2026Michelle Casady
August Business Court Docket Anchored by Mavs Ownership Fight, 70-Page Trust Ruling - The Texas Business Court stayed hot throughout August, issuing six opinions as the Court’s docket continued to mature with procedural and doctrinal opinions. Evident in several opinions is the familiar theme that has characterized the Court’s growing resolution of complex commercial disputes: Documents mean what they say, and parties are held to the bargains they struck. September 8, 2026Zack Ewing & Michael Patton

Expert Voices

SCOTX 2025–2026 Term by the Numbers: Petitioners Dominate as Reversal Rate Exceeds 75 Percent - The bottom line for this term: The odds continue to favor the petitioner once the Court grants review and sets argument. We dig into the numbers, looking at how many cases came from each Texas court of appeals, explaining how we calculated the Court’s overall affirmance and reversal rates, and examining which courts of appeals saw the most—and least—success on review.   September 9, 2026Allyson N. Ho, Bradley G. Hubbard & Elizabeth A. Kiernan
Are They Employees? The Question College Sports Can No Longer Avoid. - The NCAA just paid $2.8 billion to settle a dispute about college athletes’ rights to share in revenue generated by their sports, effectively conceding that the relationship between schools and athletes is heavily economic and not purely educational. This appears to be another key step to resolving an increasingly disputed question in college athletics: Are college athletes employees?

This is Part One of a series examining the legal battles that are reshaping college sports. August 31, 2026Marc D. Katz & Maria A. Garrett

More Stories

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Texas Business Court Is Ready to Expand. Will the Legislature Fund It?
Judge Albright Lured to A&O Shearman by Firm’s ‘Enthusiasm’ and Global IP Expertise
More Stories


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Stories You Might’ve Missed

  • The Real Harry Potter’s ‘Magic Wand — Loyalty to the Law’ - “Your boss is a crook!” Arthur Golden, a partner at Davis Polk & Wardwell and a lawyer for Big Tobacco, screamed into the telephone in the fall of 1998. “A crook!”

    On the other end of the line, Harry Potter, then a special assistant attorney general in Texas running the tobacco litigation, who was appointed three decades ago by then-Texas Attorney General Dan Morales to lead the historic lawsuit brought by the state of Texas against Big Tobacco. Potter and Golden had negotiated the details of the historic $15.3 billion settlement agreement between the state of Texas and large cigarette makers.

    “Arthur was extremely angry — livid,” Potter said. “He talked about secret lawyer contracts. I didn’t know anything about it, but it sent chills throughout my body."

    In Part II of The Texas Lawbook's series on the tobacco litigation, learn the story of the real Harry Potter, a Houston lawyer whose secret power was his ethics and commitment to the law.     July 16, 2026Mark Curriden

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