City duo lead as AA purchases British School of Motoring for £1

Eversheds and CMS Cameron McKenna have picked up lead roles advising on the administration and sale of the British School of Motoring (BSM) driving school.

The deal saw BSM acquired for £1 through a pre-pack administration by The Automobile Association (AA), with the transaction therefore bringing two of the UK's largest driving schools under one roof.

Eversheds advised administrators Price-waterhouseCoopers (PwC), with Birmingham restructuring partner Gemma Curtis leading a team also including employment partner David Beswick. PwC is a longstanding client of Eversheds.

Camerons, meanwhile, advised The AA and parent company Acromas, which is controlled by private equity houses Charterhouse, Permira and CVC Capital, with corporate partner and healthcare group head Jason Zemmel leading the team.

Curtis said: "We are extremely pleased to have advised our longstanding client PwC on a pre-packaged transaction of real merit, providing the best possible option for BSM and its stakeholders."

She added: "Everyone is predicting a flat start to 2011 and so this was a good deal to work on. The second half of the year should pick up for restructurings and finance."

The deal comes little more than a year after a November 2009 management buyout of BSM that saw Freeth Cartwright acting for the buyers and SJ Berwin advising the sellers – German private equity house Arques Industries. SJ Berwin had previously advised Arques on its original purchase of BSM from insurance company Aviva, less than a year earlier.

The BSM brand will continue to exist as a separate brand to The AA driving school following the acquisition by Acromas, which also owns brands such as Saga, Titan Travel and Great Getaways.

BSM, which is in its 100th year of trading, has 2,100 franchised driving instructors across the UK and also provides training for new instructors. It currently employs 141 staff at its Bristol headquarters, with a further 154 employed across the UK.