Linklaters

The team’s experience includes advising on transactions across the major jurisdictions of Western Europe, Central and Eastern Europe, the Americas, the Middle East and Asia. Private equity houses, investors, funds, banks and financial institutions rely on Linklaters’ market leading global experts. Linklaters’ private equity lawyers advise clients at all stages, from establishing the fund and making investments, to ongoing portfolio assistance including restructuring advice, to exiting from those investments.

Clients benefit from market-leading funds, corporate M&A, restructuring and finance experts and their understanding of both the fund-raising, fund structuring, buyout and restructuring market. Linklaters helps clients structure the best investment methods for them, from helping sponsors position themselves to ensure they are the lead equity sponsor when looking at M&A situations to clubbing together to compete for distressed assets

Clients can also rely on the proven track record of lawyers from Linklaters’ pensions, IP and tax groups to support their private equity transactions. Sector experience covers the full spectrum of industry, from telecoms to utilities, leisure and retail. 

Recent private equity transactions include advising:

• TPG Capital on its £500 million recommended P2P of GlobeOp Financial Services S.A., the leading hedge fund administration services firm.
• Bridgepoint on the acquisition of Quilter, one of the UK’s largest wealth management providers, from Morgan Stanley
• HgCapital on the combined acquisition of the Iris Software Group ("ISG") and Computer Software Group ("CSG"), two separate businesses structured as one operating group
• The Carlyle Group on the acquisition of Spanish TMT company, Telecable
• HgCapital on the £153 million recommended cash offer by HgCapital for Group NBT plc, the first announcement of a firm intention to make an offer under the new the Takeover Code Rules
• The Carlyle Group on the acquisition of a majority stake in ADP from Palamon and subsequent acquisition of IDH from the private equity arm of Bank of America Merrill Lynch ("BAML")
• The consortium of Axa Private Equity and Permira on the acquisition of online travel agency Opodo and subsequent integration with eDreams and Go Voyages
• Terra Firma on the acquisition of Rete Rinnovabile - the largest solar energy transaction in Italy in 2010 and one of the biggest deals in the photovoltaic sector in Europe in 2010.
• The Carlyle Group on the acquisition of Spanish media and telecommunications company, Telecable
• Apax on the acquisition of the Takko Group

Our Asian and European practices received the following awards:

• IFLR Asia Private Equity Deal of the Year (the KKR and Affinity / Oriental Brewery deal in Korea)
• IFLR Asia Private Equity Team of the Year

• JUVE Private Equity & Venture Capital firm of the year
• IFLR Europe Private Equity Deal of the Year (Oaktree on the acquisation of countrywide via a debt restructuring)
• IFLR Private Equity Team of the Year
• Reuters / European Capital Venture Journal (EVCJ) Private Equity Law Firm of the Year