Smith Hulsey & Busey’s mergers and acquisitions practice completed a year marked by strategic, client-driven transactions in 2025, closing 49 transactions totaling approximately $860 million in aggregate transaction value. The Jacksonville-based firm represents buyers, sellers, and investors in mergers, acquisitions, investment transactions, and financings across a wide range of industries.
Shareholder Steve Moore leads the firm’s mergers and acquisitions team, which includes managing partner Dick Lewis, shareholders David Dunn and Angela Cottrell, and associates Josh DeBarba, Max Potter, and Catherine Gleason.
On select transactions, the firm’s M&A attorneys collaborated with colleagues in other disciplines, including shareholders Bryan Putnal and David Roberts, and associate Taylor Hainley, whose real estate experience supported matters involving significant real property holdings, as well as shareholder Charmaine T.M. Chiu and associate William Templin, whose health care regulatory accumen significantly supported transactions involving health care providers and other industry participants.
The firm represented 35 clients in 2025 in a diverse mix of acquisitions, divestitures, strategic investments, and other complex matters. The majority of these matters were confidential and involved companies across more than a dozen industries, including health care, construction, automotive, manufacturing, technology, financial services, and telecommunications. SHB’s M&A attorneys are consistently recognized by leading industry rankings, including Chambers, Best Lawyers®, and Super Lawyers.
“While overall deal volume moderated in 2025, our team remained consistently active, advising clients on strategic transactions across a wide range of industries,” Moore said. “Our consistent pace is a testament to the talented and dynamic clients we are blessed to represent. Clients trust us with matters that are critical to their long-term goals, and we honor their trust by working hard every day to help them successfully achieve their objectives. In the process, we have developed a talented team of transactional lawyers and many cherished friendships.”
In previous years, SHB closed $1.1 billion in aggregate transaction value in 2024, $587 million in 2023, $900 million in 2022 and a record $1.5 billion in 2021.
SHB’s Mergers & Acquisitions team has decades of experience handling significant transactions, including joint ventures, private equity and venture capital investments, financings and strategic alliances. The firm has also represented clients in numerous cross-border transactions, including acquisitions and investments in the United Kingdom, Europe, India, Canada and Mexico.
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