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Expert Analysis

• Requiring Leave To File Amicus Briefs Is A Bad Idea

  

  A proposal to amend the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure that would require parties to get court permission before filing federal amicus briefs would eliminate the long-standing practice of consent filing and thereby make the process less open and democratic, says Lawrence Ebner at the Atlantic Legal Foundation and DRI Center.

• 4 Ways To Motivate Junior Attorneys To Bring Their Best

  

  As Gen Z and younger millennial attorneys increasingly express dissatisfaction with their work and head for the exits, the lawyers who manage them must understand and attend to their needs and priorities to boost engagement and increase retention, says Stacey Schwartz at Katten.

• Bid Protest Spotlight: Nonprecedential, Unreasonable, Scope

  

  James Tucker at MoFo examines three recent decisions showing that while the results of past competitions may inform bid strategy, they are not determinative; that an agency's award may be deemed unreasonable if it ignores available information; and that a protester may be right about an awardee's noncompliance but still lose.

• Studying NY, NJ Case Law On Employee Social Media Rights

  

  While a New Jersey state appeals court has twice determined that an employee's termination by a private employer for social media posts is not prohibited, New York has yet to take a stand on the issue — so employers' decisions on such matters still need to be assessed on a case-by-case basis, say Julie Levinson Werner and Jessica Kriegsfeld at Lowenstein Sandler.

• Pharmacies Need More Protection Against PBM Fee Practices

  

  The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services' recent reform regarding direct and indirect remuneration fees will mitigate the detrimental effects that pharmacy benefit manager policies have on struggling pharmacies, but more is needed to prevent PBMs from exploiting loopholes, says Bhavesh Desai at Mazina Law.

• Spartan Arbitration Tactics Against Well-Funded Opponents

  

  Like the ancient Spartans who held off a numerically superior Persian army at the Battle of Thermopylae, trial attorneys and clients faced with arbitration against an opponent with a bigger war chest can take a strategic approach to create a pass to victory, say Kostas Katsiris and Benjamin Argyle at Venable.

• Bid Protest Spotlight: Conflict, Latent Ambiguity, Cost Realism

  

  In this month's bid protest roundup, Markus Speidel at MoFo examines a trio of U.S. Government Accountability Office decisions with takeaways about the consequences of a teaming partner's organizational conflict of interest, a solicitation's latent ambiguity and an unreasonable agency cost adjustment.

• USCIS Fee Increases May Have Unintended Consequences

  

  U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ new fee schedule, intended to provide the agency with needed funds while minimizing the impact of higher fees on individual immigrants and their families, shifts too much of the burden onto employers, say Juan Steevens and William Coffman at Mintz.

• How Facilities Can Address Legal Risk Of Wandering Patients

  

  Wandering behavior in acute care facilities is a challenging healthcare issue rife with legal ramifications, so it's crucial for facilities to perform the correct risk assessments and appropriate interventions, says legal nurse consultant Marilyn McCullum.

• How Poor Governance, Weak Contracts Harm Cannabis Cos.

  

  Decades into cannabis decriminalization and legalization, many companies in the industry still operate on a handshake basis or fail to keep even minimally required records, which can have devastating effects and lead to costly, business-killing litigation, says Griffen Thorne at Harris Bricken.

• Fed. Circ. In Jan.: One Word Can Affect Claim Construction

  

  The Federal Circuit's recent Pacific Biosciences v. Personal Genomics decision highlights how even construction of a simple term can be dispositive, and thus disputed, in view of the specific context provided by the surrounding claim language, say Jeremiah Helm and Sean Murray at Knobbe.

• Expediting Psychedelics Approvals In The US And Canada

  

  Accelerated regulatory pathways for psychedelics in the U.S. and Canada play a pivotal role in the progression of drugs, devices and novel therapies toward commercialization, say Kimberly Chew at Husch Blackwell, and Ana Dukic and Sabrina Ramkellawan at AxialBridge.

• How Merck Settlement Can Inform Cyberinsurance Approach

  

  This month's settlement in Merck v. ACE spotlights how cyber exclusions have evolved since the significant decision in the case — allowing for insurance coverage despite the presence of a policy war exclusion — and where else corporate risk managers may look for coverage in case of a cyberattack, say attorneys at McGuireWoods.