It was 4:30 a.m. on Monday, Sept. 2, 2013, Labor Day, and Randal Milch, the general counsel of U.S. telecom giant Verizon Communications Inc., had just left the New York offices of the company’s lawyers, Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz. In a few hours’ time, Verizon was due to announce a record-breaking $130 billion deal to buy U.K. telecom company Vodafone Group Plc out of its mobile services joint venture, Verizon Wireless. There was just one problem: The deal wasn’t finished.
Back at Wachtell’s base on West 52nd Street, hordes of caffeinated lawyers frantically rushed to put the final documents together. Milch had just pulled a 12-hour overnight Sunday shift, but sleep was out of the question. Walking down 6th Avenue on the way to his Chelsea home for a quick shower and shave before heading out to New Jersey for the final pre-announcement board meeting, and with the sun still yet to rise, he called his opposite number, Vodafone general counsel Rosemary Martin, to thrash out some “fairly significant” final sticking points relating to what he would only describe as “tax issues.”
This content has been archived. It is available through our partners, LexisNexis® and Bloomberg Law.
To view this content, please continue to their sites.
Not a Lexis Subscriber?
Subscribe Now
Not a Bloomberg Law Subscriber?
Subscribe Now
LexisNexis® and Bloomberg Law are third party online distributors of the broad collection of current and archived versions of ALM's legal news publications. LexisNexis® and Bloomberg Law customers are able to access and use ALM's content, including content from the National Law Journal, The American Lawyer, Legaltech News, The New York Law Journal, and Corporate Counsel, as well as other sources of legal information.
For questions call 1-877-256-2472 or contact us at [email protected]
