Justin R. Howard

• Represented a leading provider of paperboard packaging in a transformational combination with a division of a Fortune 100 competitor using an Up-C partnership structure.
• Represented a worldwide technology systems integration services company in the acquisition of a distressed public company via a tender offer structure.
• Represented a NYSE-listed REIT in forming a joint venture with a consortium of institutional investors to acquire 1.1 million acres of prime East Texas timberlands for $1.39 billion.
• Represented a leading Scandinavian aluminum manufacturer as the successful bidder in a Section 363 auction that doubled the size of the company.
• Represented multiple REITs in mergers, internalizations, and other strategic liquidity transactions.
• Represented a publicly traded telecommunications firm in a $2.6 billion leveraged buyout by an affiliate of the Carlyle Group. 
• Represented a publicly traded biometric security company in a $400 million sale to the world's largest technology company.
• Represented a leading agricultural company in several transactions, including the defense of a hostile takeover and a subsequent negotiated sale for $1.25 billion, a $200 million high-yield debt offering, and a $600 million conversion/recapitalization from a cooperative association to a for-profit company and the related $150 million initial public offering. 
• Represented a publicly traded casual dining restaurant chain in its sale for more than $1.3 billion.
• Represented a specialty pharmaceutical company in its sale for more than $2.2 billion.

Justin Howard is co-leader of Alston & Bird’s Mergers & Acquisitions Group. He represents public and private companies across a variety of industries in complex mergers and acquisitions, including leveraged acquisitions and dispositions of portfolio investments by private equity funds. He has represented issuers and underwriters in dozens of public and private offerings of debt, equity, and convertible securities and advises public companies on a variety of corporate governance matters. 

Justin has been chosen as a Rising Star five times by Law & Politics in the areas of Mergers & Acquisitions, Securities, and Corporate Finance. He has been listed in The Best Lawyers in America^© in the Mergers & Acquisitions category since 2014. From 2008 through 2014, Justin was an adjunct professor at the University of Georgia School of Law, teaching a course on mergers and acquisitions.

Bar Admissions

• Georgia

Education

• University of Georgia (J.D., 1999)
• University of Georgia (B.B.A., 1996)