Business & Commercial Litigation

Most business disputes are not really about the law. They are about money, leverage, and time, and the law is the instrument companies reach for when the ordinary tools of business stop working. We start every matter by understanding the commercial problem underneath the legal one, because the client's real goal is almost never to win a lawsuit. It is to get paid, to stop something, to protect a relationship worth keeping, or to end a distraction that is costing more than it is worth.

The disputes we handle

Our commercial litigation practice covers the fights that closely held companies actually have. That includes breach of contract claims on both sides of the ledger, disputes over the sale of goods and services, business torts like tortious interference and unfair competition, disputes with departing employees over trade secrets and non-competes, and the emergencies that require a court to act quickly.

• Breach of contract, whether you are owed performance or accused of failing to deliver it
• Business torts, including tortious interference with contracts or business relationships and unfair competition
• Trade secret and non-compete disputes when an employee or competitor crosses a line
• Injunctions and temporary restraining orders, both seeking them and defending against them
• Disputes over the sale of a business, earnouts, and post-closing indemnification claims
• Collection of large commercial debts where an ordinary demand has failed

How a Michigan commercial case actually unfolds

A lawsuit in Michigan follows a predictable arc, and understanding it is the first step to controlling its cost. A case opens with a complaint and answer, moves into discovery where each side exchanges documents and takes depositions, passes through dispositive motions where a judge can end all or part of the case, and, if it survives that far, reaches trial. The great majority of commercial cases resolve before trial, often at or after a well-timed motion or mediation. Knowing where the pressure points sit lets us spend your money where it changes the outcome and not where it merely runs the clock.

The first seventy-two hours

When a matter is an emergency, a departing partner draining an account, a competitor using your confidential information, a customer about to breach in a way that cannot be undone, the first days matter more than any that follow. Michigan courts can issue a temporary restraining order and then a preliminary injunction to hold the situation in place while the merits are sorted out, but the moving party has to act fast and arrive with proof. We are built to respond the same day, because the record you preserve and the motion you file at the start often decides the case.

Litigate or settle: a business decision

The most valuable thing a commercial litigator does is help a client decide whether to fight at all. Every dispute has a settlement value and a litigation cost, and the two have to be weighed honestly and early, before pride and sunk cost take over. Our framework on whether to litigate or settle lays out exactly how we run that analysis. We give you a candid read on the merits, a realistic range of outcomes, and the cost of each phase, and then we make a recommendation and stand behind it. Sometimes the answer is a hard, fast fight that resets the other side's expectations. Sometimes it is a settlement that ends things before the fees exceed the stakes. What it is never is a case run long for its own sake.

What it costs, and how we price it

Litigation is hard to quote as a single number because the other side gets a vote on how long and how hard the case runs. What we can do, and do, is break the matter into phases, put a budget on each phase, and tell you what the next stage should cost before you enter it. That turns an open-ended worry into a series of decisions you control. Cost is driven by a handful of things, the volume of documents, the number of depositions, the complexity of the facts, and how aggressively the other side litigates, and we keep you looking at those drivers rather than a running meter.

If you want to understand the drivers before you are in a dispute, our briefing on what a commercial case actually costs walks through them in detail. And if a fight is looming, the single best thing you can do is get organized before you file, which is the whole point of our litigation readiness guide. Often, a well-drafted commercial contract is what keeps a dispute from ever starting.

Working with us

We staff cases leanly and we do the work that moves them. You will not be handed to a rotating cast of associates or billed for five lawyers to attend a hearing that needs one. Dana Beckett or Julian Moss stays close to every matter, you get plain-language updates at the moments that matter, and you always know what the next decision is and what it will cost. The goal is a resolution that serves the business, reached by the shortest route the facts allow.