David “Chips” Pruet's client-first philosophy is the cornerstone of his business litigation practice.
Chips has spent his 24-plus year career helping clients across the country develop strategic solutions to complex business disputes. Those disputes regularly involve the prosecution or defense of high-exposure claims that can only be favorably resolved, by settlement or trial, with a carefully designed and executed strategy. Chips places a priority on clear and transparent communications with his clients and particularly enjoys working with his clients to develop both short and long-term objectives and a thoughtful plan for achieving them.
Chips regularly handles commercial disputes across numerous industries, including healthcare, energy, banking, insurance, private equity, securities, manufacturing, construction and commercial real estate. He is particularly skilled in defending and prosecuting claims involving shareholder rights, corporate and trustee fiduciary duties, estate plans, trade secrets, and non-competition agreements.
While Chips has over two decades of experience litigating commercial cases in courtrooms, he also frequently assists clients avoid the courtroom altogether by developing creative out-of-court solutions. Chips has, for example, in recent years negotiated or renegotiated agreements involving hundreds of millions of dollars, including acquisition agreements and long-term supply agreements.
Chips also regularly prosecutes claims for corporate plaintiffs, and, in recent years, has secured over $57 million in recoveries for his clients.
Representative examples of Chips’s work include:
- Successfully prosecuting claims involving a commercial lease on behalf of a major retailer resulting in favorable judgments affirmed on appeal by the Eleventh Circuit and the Alabama Supreme Court.
- Negotiating a settlement of claims involving the alleged misappropriation of over $100 million.
- Obtaining a defense verdict in a zoning dispute that allowed a local developer to complete the construction of a 100,000-square-foot mixed-use shopping center.
- Securing a $9 million settlement arising from a transaction involving the sale of assets for in excess of $65 million.
- Securing a settlement valued at over $30 million arising from a transaction involving the sale of assets for in excess of $700 million.
- Defeating a corporation’s attempt to enjoin its bondholders from seeking accelerated payments on more than $2 billion in debt.
- Securing a $6.5 million settlement in connection with a long-term supply agreement.
- Successfully enjoining an executive diverting a corporate opportunities and seizing control of a client’s business
- Obtaining summary judgment, affirmed on appeal, in a commercial dispute in which a contract manufacturer sought over $10 million in damages.
- Negotiating a favorable settlement for a major retailer in a condemnation proceeding involving allegedly blighted property.
- Securing dismissal of a trade secret claim asserted against a defense industry contractor involving the alleged transmission of protected information to overseas entities.
When not engaged with his cases, Chips plays a vital role on Team Lightfoot. For over a decade, he has served as the partner responsible for Lightfoot’s paralegals, acting as an important liaison between staff and attorneys.
Chips consistently receives recognition for his work in business litigation from organizations such as Thomson Reuters' Super Lawyers and The Best Lawyers in America. The Birmingham Business Journal recently acknowledged Chips’s dedication to his clients by naming him as one of the “Best of the Bar” in 2024. The Best Lawyers in America also recognized Chips as its 2024 “Lawyer of the Year” for Litigation-Construction, a designation reserved for the single lawyer in each practice area and region receiving the highest peer-reviewed feedback in a given year.
Chips also authored a chapter titled “Making the Kitchen Hotter: Effective Use of Motions to Compel,” in a 2018 book on trial strategies published by the American Bar Association.
Chips has been an active participant on the junior and regular boards for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society and was named runner-up for their Man/Woman of the Year campaign in 2013. He was also a founding member of the Arthritis Foundation’s junior board. Chips is a proud husband and father of three children. He and his family attend the Cathedral Church of the Advent.
