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Schulz pulls his weight in M&A deals

Schulz pulls his weight in M&A deals

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Schulz
Schulz

For Kevin Schulz, an attorney at Foley & Lardner in Milwaukee, success is when his client closes on a deal, whether it be the sale of a family business or of a major league baseball team.

“It’s exciting and rewarding to play a role in a major transaction for a client,” he said. “These deals are significant events for that business and reaching that end point is very satisfying.”

Schulz, who helps lead Foley’s sports team, has played big roles in several cases involving prominent sports teams, including the Milwaukee Brewers, Chicago Cubs, the LA Dodgers and the Milwaukee Bucks. He has also worked on deals that set up regional sports networks and represented teams, including the Green Bay Packers, in negotiations over media rights.

Schulz said transactions can take anywhere from a few months to complete to more than two years, which was how long he had worked with his clients to buy the Chicago Cubs.

“When a business is sold, there are so many areas affected and I work with other attorneys to make sure everything is coordinated,” he said. “The deals I work on tend to be very complex and some of the decisions are driven by tax implications.”

Deals involving sports team are some of the most complex, Schulz said. The sale of a team is not always between two people or businesses, since leagues have also approved sales, he said.

“It’s interesting working in that regulatory environment since other owners or the league itself has to approve a sale,” Schulz said. “Selling a team is also a competitive process. There is usually not one prospective buyer.”

Sports deals make up only one part of Schulz’ practice. He also handles deals involving manufacturers and the food-and-beverage industry.

“The sports deals attract the most attention, which adds another level of complexity,” he said. “The public is very interested anytime in sports when team may be sold and there are more people watching what you are doing,”

Wisconsin Law Journal: What makes your work important to you?

Kevin Schulz: As a business transactional attorney, who does mostly mergers and acquisitions and other commercial transactions for our clients, it is rewarding to be able to assist our clients with transformative transactions for their businesses (or, in the case of individual business owners, for their lives). I enjoy identifying the particular issues or challenges of the deal and helping craft creative solutions. It may sound a bit cliché, but I like doing deals because they truly can be win-win propositions for both sides.

WLJ: Who is your hero in the legal field?

Schulz: My hero in the legal field (and beyond) would be my dad. He was a long-time in-house counsel at First Wisconsin/Firstar Bank. He never pressured me to follow in his footsteps, but he set an example for me that I naturally wanted to follow. One of the things that he always prided himself in, and which I have tried to emulate, is injecting pragmatism into the practice of law. Clients like knowing, and trying to minimize, the risks, but they also do not want to needlessly delay or even prevent the consummation of the transaction by going down every single rabbit hole, no matter how remote or unlikely they are. Therefore, I try to take practical approaches when counseling clients on transactions.

WLJ: What do you do outside of work to deal with stress from the office?

Schulz: I enjoy spending time with my family when I am not in the office. I have three daughters (ages 9, 4 and 2), and I enjoy spending time with them and watching them participate in their various activities. I also live for Notre Dame sports, particularly football and basketball, so anytime I have an opportunity to watch them on TV, I try to do that.

WLJ: What’s one thing many people get wrong about what you do?

Schulz: People who are not familiar with M&A deals sometimes do not realize how complicated they are. The deals require the coordination of lots of different practice areas (including tax, real estate, environmental, intellectual property, employee benefits, labor and employment, and finance, among others) and have a lot of moving parts. Also, there is no “one size fits all”—each deal has its own unique issues and considerations. I work closely with each client to ensure that we understand the client’s goals and objectives for each deal.

WLJ: What’s your favorite memory from law school?

Schulz: My favorite memory was probably graduating. I enjoyed learning new things and making friends in law school, but I was excited to start that next chapter and take what I had learned in school and apply it to the real world practice of law.

WLJ: Is there a certain case that stands out to you?

Schulz: In my world, it is about deals, not cases. I have been fortunate to work on a lot of interesting, complex, and oftentimes high-profile deals. One of the most interesting and complex was the Chicago Cubs deal — we represented the Ricketts family in its acquisition of the Cubs and Wrigley Field. It had a very a complicated structure, and the deal took lots of twists and turns. It was also extremely long — from the time we were engaged until the time the deal closed was two and a half years!

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