Valuation, Forensic Accounting & Litigation Services Conference (VFALS)

Christopher Cooper, Managing Director, Vallit Advisors, LLC

Brett Cooper is a Managing Director with Vallit Advisors, where he provides business valuation, litigation support, and forensic consulting services to attorneys, business owners, and organizations across industries. He brings more than two decades of specialized experience in appraisal and valuation, Mr. Cooper has over 25 years of experience providing business valuation, litigation support, and forensic consulting services. He is one of fewer than 100 members of the American Society of Appraisers to earn the specialty credential of ASA in Intangible Asset Valuation.
His experience includes valuations of going concerns, intangible assets, minority interests, and derivative interests for tax, financial reporting, mergers and acquisitions, ESOPs, and litigation. He has also consulted on intellectual property matters involving infringement damages, licensing agreements, and transfer transactions, and has provided expert reports and testimony addressing economic damages, lost profits, solvency, reasonable compensation, and business interruption.

James Hitchner, Managing Director, Financial Valuation Advisors, Inc

Jim Hitchner is managing director of Financial Valuation Advisors www.finvaluation.com and is president of The Financial Consulting Group www.gofcg.org. He is also CEO of Valuation Products and Services (VPS) www.valuationproducts.com. 
  
Mr. Hitchner is editor/coauthor of the books the Hitchner Pratt Fishman Consensus View Q&A Guide to Financial Valuation and the VPS DLOM Guide and Toolkit, published by VPS. He is also editor/coauthor of Financial Valuation Applications and Models (FVAM), fourth edition; Financial Valuation Workbook (FVW), fourth edition; and Valuation for Financial Reporting: Fair Value, Business Combinations, Intangible Assets, Goodwill, and Impairment Analysis, third edition, all published by Wiley. He is also coauthor of PPC’s Guide To Business Valuations, 28th edition, published by Thomson Reuters.  FVAM and FVW have been adopted by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) for its five-day Business Valuation School course and by the National Association of Certified Valuators and Analysts (NACVA) for its two-day Advanced Business Valuation course. The VPS DLOM Guide and Toolkit is the core resource for NACVA’s one-day DLOM course. Mr. Hitchner designed all three courses.

He has spent over 38 years in valuation services, including as a shareholder with Phillips Hitchner Group, partner-in-charge of valuation services for the Southern Region of Coopers & Lybrand (currently PricewaterhouseCoopers), and senior appraiser with American Appraisal Associates. In the valuation area he has coauthored over 20 courses, taught over 60 courses, published over 140 articles, and has made over 350 conference and webinar presentations.  

He is also an inductee in the AICPA Business Valuation Hall of Fame and a two-time recipient of the AICPA’s Business Valuation Volunteer of the Year award. He was also one of the four original members of the AICPA Business Valuation Standards Writing Task Force and served for the entire six years, up to the June 2007 official release of the standards.

Jason Soman, Soman Forensic & Valuation CPAs

Jason is a founder Soman Stewart CPA PLLC, a firm he launched after spending nearly a decade at prestigious CPA and consulting firms, focused on advising attorneys, business owners and high net worth individuals on matters involving business valuation and forensic accounting in the context of marital dissolution, probate and trust litigation, commercial litigation, estate/gift taxation and for transaction purposes. Over his career, Jason has regularly defended his analyses and conclusions for clients in high stakes situations and has testified as an expert witness at hearings, deposition and trials.

Sheri Schultz, Managing Partner, Fiske, A Springline Company

Sheri Schultz brings over 20 years of experience to her clients, offering both professional expertise and practical insight toward business valuations and litigation support services. In addition to being a licensed CPA, Sheri is Certified in Financial Forensics (CFF), and holds the designation of Accredited in Business Valuation (ABV).
Since joining Fiske & Company in 1990 as Director of the Valuation Services Department, Sheri has provided business valuation services and counsel to manufacturers, wholesalers, retailers, medical practices, restaurants, service entities, and public companies. A frequent speaker on topics such as  business valuation, tax planning and estate planning, she also has broad-based tax experience in business mergers and acquisitions, reorganizations, estate issues and tax compliance.

Sheri's certifications and professional background enable her to provide expert advice and counsel to outside CPAs as well as lawyers representing clients in business litigation where business valuation is involved. Her practice focus is in business damages claims, fraud, and business transitions of all kinds including family succession. Sheri has provided expert witness testimony and consulting services in complex estate and accounting matters.

As Chair of the Business Valuation/Litigation Committee for the FICPA, Sheri helped to develop the Valuation and Litigation Section for the State of Florida; she recently stepped down from the Board of Governors for the FICPA where she served for 6 years. Her position on the National Business Valuation Committee for the AICPA has been instrumental in the advancement of the business valuation discipline. Sheri currently serves on the AICPA's ABV Credential Committee and as the Chair of the AICPA's Champion Task Force.
Sheri assisted in writing and gaining approval for the AICPA Statement on Standards for Valuation Services No.1, Valuation of a Business, Business Ownership Interest, Security or Intangible Asset, which became effective January 1, 2008. All CPA's must comply with these standards when writing business valuation reports.

Sheri's recent awards include being named a "Key Partner" in Accounting by the South Florida Business Journal in 2012, a "Woman Extraordinaire" by Business Leader Magazine, and a "Top CPA in Litigation Support" by the South Florida Legal Guide. Professional articles she has authored have been published in the South Florida Business Journal, the Daily Business Review, the South Florida Legal Guide, and the Broward Barrister. Sheri spends a great deal of time assisting charitable organizations and has been a Board of Trustee member of Jewish Federation of Broward County for many years and is past Chair of their Professional Advisory Committee.