Alex Kennedy

I will unpack problems within companies and partnerships to navigate you to an outcome. Everything has an answer if you look hard enough.

Advocacy and Higher Rights of Audience

I am a qualified Solicitor Advocate with Higher Rights of Audience, enabling me to represent clients directly in the Higher Courts, including the High Court and appellate Courts.

The qualification has proved helpful for clients as it means I can provide seamless representation from early strategic advice through to advocacy at hearings and trials, without the need to instruct external counsel unless appropriate. Clients benefit from continuity, cost-efficiency and my in-depth understanding of the case from the outset avoiding the need to brief counsel.

I appear on behalf of clients in contested hearings, interim applications and trials, particularly in commercial litigation involving shareholder, partnership and director disputes.

Shareholder disputes

When people go into business together, they rarely imagine falling out. This is especially true of friends and family. Entrepreneurs understandably prioritise getting up and running rather than imagining how their relationship might break down, but when a dispute crops up this causes problems, especially where there are controlling interests held by shareholder/directors.

Disputes between shareholders or directors can be fraught at the best of times, especially if the relationship was poorly defined because of inadequate articles of association or a badly drafted shareholders agreement. I look for ways of quick resolution to save the business. Particular expertise includes:

Expertise

• Duties and rights of directors
• Rights of minority shareholders
• Structuring the terms for the sale of shares in private companies including share buy backs
• Plotting strategy.
• Sound commercial knowledge.
• How to approach settlement opportunities.

Partnership disputes

I work on resolving disputes within partnerships in a wide variety of sectors including but not limited to lawyers, accountants, recruitment agents, hedge funds, funeral directors, vets and many more. I have experience in acting for individual partners or the partnership (but not at the same time!). Each case is delicate and highly-fact specific requiring skill and judgement at each step.

Expertise

• Familiarity with various legal structures of partnership.
• Analyst of the case to provide an honest opinion on the chances of success.
• Drafting workable partnership and LLP agreements.
• Commercial awareness.
• Identifying opportunities for dispute resolution and mediation.

Director disputes

I act for both employers and directors in a variety of situations including dismissal, enforcing and defending restrictive covenants and redundancy. Directors are also employees and benefit from protection against unfair dismissal as well as breach of contract. There is also the added complication of what will happen to the shares held by a departing director. Litigation is incredibly expensive and slow so resolution out of court is nearly always the best solution. Particular expertise includes:

Expertise

• Supporting smaller employers who may not not have a dedicated resource and need guidance.
• Specialist expertise in dealing with directors who are also shareholders to avoid disruption to the business.
• Dealing with commercial issues for example non-compete clauses, consultancy agreements, director service agreements.
• Managing the employment dismissal process, communications and settlement agreements.
• Preparing Employment Tribunal strategy. 

Testimonials

“An efficient, speed, friendly service, provided by Alex Kennedy, who listened to everything I had to say before giving me the solution which was really helpful. I would definitely recommend the team to anyone looking for a professional legal service.”

“I was pleased with the outcome to my partnership dispute and the service provided by Alex provided a level of trust and psychological comfort in a very stressful time. Definitely recommend.”

“Alex was very helpful about an urgent shareholder dispute I found myself in. Despite the issue potentially being complex and the advice being different to what I was expecting, he nevertheless took the time to explain in a clear and understandable way what the view was so I was better informed about the situation in hand. I would use Gannons again without hesitation in future.”