“…In contrast to these reactions, cross‐coupling reactions between sp 3 ‐hybridized carbon centers5 appear to be a useful and, potentially, more‐promising tool, because they are applicable to the synthesis of both saturated and unsaturated fatty acids and they are free from the problems associated with double‐bond stereochemistry 6–8. However, owing to the lower tolerance of the carboxylic group toward organometallic reagents, including transition‐metal complexes,9, 10 protected carboxy groups3c, 4b, 8, 11 or their synthetic equivalents3a,d, 4c are often employed. Herein, we report a convenient and efficient one‐pot procedure for the construction of carbon frameworks of fatty acids by using the nickel‐catalyzed cross‐coupling of alkyl halides that contain a carboxy functionality with Grignard reagents in the presence of 1,3‐butadiene as an additive,8e, 12, 13 in combination with an in situ protection procedure 14.…”