Weil Gotshal & Manges has secured a role opposite Slaughter and May and Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer on Premier Foods' £460m acquisition of Campbell Soup's UK and Irish businesses.

Weil Gotshal is acting for regular client Premier Foods on the proposed acquisition with London managing partner Mike Francies and private equity partner Ian Hamilton leading.

Premier already owns many household brands, but the Campbell Soup acquisition will also give it Oxo, Batchelors, Homepride and Fray Bentos.

Weil Gotshal has acted on a range of deals for Premier including advising its former owner, private equity house Hicks Muse Tate & Furst (now Lion Capital), on Premier's £527m IPO in 2004. Other transactions it has advised on include Premier's £80m sale of Typhoo Tea in November last year, its £172m acquisition of Marlow Foods in June 2005 and the acquisitions of Bird's Custard and Angel Delight from Kraft Foods in 2004 and Ambrosia from Unilever in 2003.

Hamilton told Legal Week: "We do all of Premier's main M&A work and have been involved in this auction since April. What made this acquisition more unusual was funding it through a rights issue at the same time."

Slaughters is acting for underwriters Merrill Lynch and Hoare Govett and sponsor NM Rothschild on the £450m acquisition funding, which is intended to be raised primarily through a rights issue. Corporate partners Nilufer von Bismarck and Roland Turnill are leading the Slaughters team.

Freshfields corporate partner Martin Taylor is leading the team, which includes IP/ IT partner Avril Martin-dale, acting for regular client Campbell Soup on the disposal.

First reported on legalweek.com (13 July)