Selecting the most noteworthy decisions from a year’s worth of business divorce cases normally is a daunting challenge given the volume and diversity of such cases involving corporations, partnerships, and the new, reigning champion among closely held business entities—the LLC. But not for 2021, a year in which a series of important rulings by the Commercial Division and the Appellate Division, First, Second, and Fourth Departments, unquestionably led the pack in clarifying both substantive and procedural rules governing disputes among business co-owners.

Cases of the procedural ilk highlighted in this year’s review include a decision declining subject matter jurisdiction in a dissolution case involving a foreign LLC despite a forum selection clause placing jurisdiction exclusively in New York courts, and a decision granting judicial dissolution in a summary proceeding where the respondents failed to proffer evidentiary support for their position or to request an evidentiary hearing.