Bio

Julianna Plawecki serves as outside general counsel for privately held businesses and prepares estate and business succession plans for business owners and high-net-worth individuals. She helps businesses and their owners grow and protect their assets through entity structuring, contract negotiation, succession planning, estate and trust planning, and tax-reduction strategies. As outside general counsel, Juli provides practical advice to help clients find strategic solutions so they can grow their businesses. Juli helps her clients select and form entities, draft and negotiate contracts, obtain WBE, MBE and DBE certifications, and pursue mergers and acquisitions. She serves as their primary legal advisor, coordinating the assistance of other Dentons attorneys on any legal questions that may arise, such as employment, intellectual property, real estate, tax, and immigration matters. When it is time to exit a closely held business, she helps clients craft and pursue a comprehensive exit strategy, whether it involves a buyout by the other owners, a third-party sale, litigation, or a combination of these approaches. Juli works closely with her clients to understand their businesses and family dynamics and helps them navigate those dynamics as they craft plans to achieve their generational wealth transfer and business succession goals. She collaborates with her client’s advisory team to develop holistic solutions to achieve the client’s objectives. She prepares shareholder, operating, and other buy-sell agreements, assists clients with insurance planning, and has experience with complex estate planning devices, such as GRATs and IDGTS. Juli also has experience in sophisticated trust administration, including complex beneficial interest transfers and the management of processes and protocols for established trusts. As a member of the Dentons team advising The Gatorade Trust, which was created for the benefit of the University of Florida doctors and others who invented Gatorade in 1965, Juli helps the inventors and their families preserve their legacy and protect their interests for future generations. Juli draws on her prior litigation experience to provide valuable perspective when advising clients on risk assessment and litigation avoidance. With a deep understanding of the implications of litigation, she helps clients understand the claims, risks involved and potential outcomes, and to evaluate those scenarios against their desired business outcomes.