Bio

Michael Ecker has an MBA and more than 30 years of experience as a business lawyer. He focuses his practice on corporate matters such as emerging growth and technology, financial institutions, and health law. He also provides counseling to closely held and family-owned businesses, and has particular experience with assisting in the buying and selling of businesses, including complicated transactions involving multi-level financing, mergers, equity arrangements and earn-out provisions. Clients rely on his counsel throughout all stages of these transactions, including due diligence guidance; entity formation; the negotiation and drafting letters of intent and term sheets; valuation; and analyzing, negotiating, and securing financing. He also does lending work, including traditional asset-based loans as well as those with fine artwork as collateral. Michael also serves as general counsel for a number of clients, fulfilling what is virtually an in-house counsel role. Because Michael spent seven years as general counsel for an entrepreneurial health care organization and a physician practice management company, he has a deep understanding of the needs of his business clients. As a trusted advisor, he shares his clients’ sense of urgency and responds to calls and emails to help address client challenges and solve their problems. In addition to advising on general business issues such as those related to strategy, employment, real estate, and contract negotiation, Michael also provides counsel to family-owned businesses on issues including succession planning, the development of family councils and facilitation of family meetings, developing board leadership, the resolution of owner disputes, and negotiating and implementing buy-sell agreements. Whether handling matters for individuals, closely held businesses, or large organizations, Michael always brings an energetic resourcefulness to the table. He negotiates business relationships using a principled approach, including the “Getting to Yes” interest analysis, to assist his clients in reaching their goals. He has served as seller’s counsel in a number of multimillion-dollar deals, including a $75 million roll-over sale of a pool filter manufacturer, $50 million merger of a large quarry company, the $40 million sale of an insurance brokerage company, the $9 million sale of a neuromonitoring company, the $5 million sale of an orthopedic medical group to a hospital, and a $1.5 million strategic acquisition of an auto body shop.