Trio of top firms share lead on €875m restructuring
Linklaters, Bingham and CC act on latest major restructuring deal to hit Europe
November 22, 2006 at 07:03 PM
2 minute read
Linklaters, Bingham McCutchen and Clifford Chance (CC) have taken lead roles on one of Europe's biggest restructuring deals this year – the €875m (£593m) debt restructuring of brake manufacturer TMD Friction.
The restructuring, which completed earlier this month (10 November), began in the spring.
Linklaters advised TMD, deploying lawyers from nine jurisdictions, including Germany, France and the US. Global head of restruc-turing Robert Elliott led the team alongside London restructuring partner Bruce Bell and German partner Jochen Laufersweiler.
City lawyers believe this could be the dawn of a new era of European restructuring deals, as companies taken over by private equity houses in recent years get into difficulty.
Bingham London managing partner James Roome, assisted by associate Holly Neavill, advised TMD's mezzanine lenders, Davidson Kempner, Babson and Clearwater. Weil Gotshal & Manges handled the German issues for the lenders.
CC set up Chinese walls on the process to act for both Credit Suisse, as arrangers of the new senior debt, and Montagu Private Equity, as the biggest shareholder in TMD Friction. The firm received client consent to take both roles.
CC banking partner Emma Folds led the team for Credit Suisse while restructuring partner Nicholas Frome led for Montagu.
Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer banking and restructuring partner Chris Howard advised JP Morgan Chase as the existing senior lender.
Roome told Legal Week: "It was interesting for a number of reasons.
It was a very complicated cross-border deal, a lot of deals have gone wrong in Germany and, as a private equity leveraged buy-out (LBO) restructuring, it is the fore-runner of a lot of deals to come."
Linklaters' Bell added: "Interests of the shareholders and of the company could well be different, and with more LBO defaults expected, firms will have to choose whether they act for the company or the private equity house."
In another high-profile restructuring, DLA Piper and Taylor Wessing are advising on the collapse of Christmas savings club Farepak. DLA Piper is acting for creditors HBOS while Taylor Wessing is acting for the administrator, BDO Stoy Hayward. Macfarlanes is understood to be acting for Farepak.
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