Wachtell, Cleary bag $4.5bn optician buy-out

Elite Manhattan firms Wachtell Lipton Rosen & Katz and Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton have bagged the lead roles on Warburg Pincus' $4.5bn (£2.3bn) acquisition of opticians Bausch & Lomb. Cleary advised the buyer, with M&A partners Robert Davis and David Leinwand spearheading the New York-based team alongside finance partner Meme Stowers.

May 16, 2007 at 11:17 AM

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Elite Manhattan firms Wachtell Lipton Rosen & Katz and Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton have bagged the lead roles on Warburg Pincus' $4.5bn (£2.3bn) acquisition of opticians Bausch & Lomb.

Cleary advised the buyer, with M&A partners Robert Davis and David Leinwand spearheading the New York-based team alongside finance partner Meme Stowers.

Wachtell advised Bausch, with corporate partners Patricia Vlahakis and Joshua Cammaker playing prominent roles.

The deal is Cleary's latest major instruction from Warburg Pincus, having advised the investment bank on its $5.1bn (£2.58bn) acquisition of Neiman Marcus Group in 2005, which it acquired as part of a consortium that included Texas Pacific Group.

The deal comes amid a slew of big-money buy-outs in the US. Last month, Simpson Thacher & Bartlett and Dechert landed plum advisory roles on Blackstone's $8bn (£4bn) disposal of hotel chain Extended Stay America.

Simpson Thacher acted on behalf of regular client Blackstone on that deal, while Dechert is advising the buyer, the Lightstone Group.