Chesapeake Case Study

Dr. Israel Shaked is a founder and managing director of The Michel-Shaked Group in Boston, where he provides valuation, expert testimony, corporate finance and business consulting services to corporations and government entities worldwide. He is also a professor of finance and economics at the Boston University Questrom School of Management and a two-time winner of Boston University’s Broderick Prize for Excellence in Teaching. His academic and professional research covers such areas as valuation, bankruptcy, fraudulent conveyance, investment analysts, financial distress, LBOs, international business, mergers and acquisitions, economics, corporate structure analysis, corporate financial decisions and capital markets.

Dr. Shaked was director of the Boston Chartered Financial Analysts (CFA) Examination Review Program for 19 years, as well as a co-founder and director of the Institute of Chartered Pension Professionals (ICPP). He served for 20 years as a member of the ABI Journal editorial board and a contributing editor. He has also authored or co-authored numerous articles and several books, including A Practical Guide to Bankruptcy Valuation, Second Edition (ABI 2016), and he appears regularly on television and in the press commenting on contemporary financial and business issues.

Dr. Shaked has delivered hundreds of seminars to corporate executives and law firms globally, and has been engaged as an expert witness offering testimony at depositions, arbitrations and trials on numerous cases. He is renowned and relied on for his expertise in valuation matters, and his ability to explain the complexities of valuation clearly to a judge, jury, arbitrator or regulatory authority.

Mr. Shaked received a B.A. in economics and a B.A. in statistics from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, his M.B.A. with a concentration in finance from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and his Doctor of Business Administration (D.B.A.) from Harvard Business School.

Alexandra Schwarzman is a restructuring partner in Kirkland & Ellis LLP’s Chicago office, where her practice focuses on all aspects of corporate restructuring, bankruptcy and insolvency proceedings. Her representative matters include Chesapeake Energy Corp., Salt Creek Midstream, Jack Cooper Ventures, Inc., EXCO Resources, Inc., GST Autoleather, Inc. and Sequa Corp.

Ms. Schwarzmann received the Rising Star Award from the National Immigrant Justice Center in 2015. She received her B.A. magna cum laude in political science in 2007 from Vanderbilt University and her J.D. in 2012 from New York University School of Law, where she worked on the Journal of Law and Business.

William S. Ebanks is a managing director in the Houston office of AlixPartners, LLP and has mor than 30 years of industry and consulting experience, primarily in the energy, industrial and high-tech fields. He has worked across the entire energy value chain, including upstream E&P, oilfield services, downstream R&M and petrochemicals.

Mr. Ebanks specializes in profitability improvement via operational and SG&A cost-optimization, organizational restructuring and growth strategy development in both healthy and distressed environments. In addition, he has experience in post-merger integration and performance measurement and management.

Mr. Ebanks began his career at Tenneco as a production operations engineer in the oil & gas industry. He is a member of ABI, SPE, IPAA, PESA and the Oil Council.

Mr. Ebanks received his B.S. in petroleum engineering from the University of Texas at Austin and his M.B.A. in finance and accounting from Rice University.