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On November 14 Morgan Lewis voted to admit 227 partners from Bingham McCutcheon into the firm’s global partnership.

The firm will now consist of almost 2000 lawyers in 28 offices around the world (including Moscow, its only CEE office) — making it one one of the largest firms in the world. The new partners are expected to join Morgan Lewis before the end of November 2014.

Morgan Lewis was founded in Philadelphia in 1873, and was, before the merger, the United States’ 12th-largest law firm.

Bingham McCutchen traces its history back to 1891, and its final form was the result of a 2002 merger of Boston-based Bingham, Dana & Gould and the Californian McCutchen, Doyle, Brown & Enersen firm. The firm had begun to struggle in recent years, with more than 50 partners leaving the firm since last year (including 19, most in the highly profitable London office, just in September), and lay-offs of more than 225 lawyers since 2012. At the time of the vote, the firm had 307 partners — 80 of which were apparently not brought on board by Morgan Lewis — and about 750 lawyers world-wide. The firm, in terms of revenue, ranked 26th in the United States in 2012, according to American Lawyer; it fell to 37th last year.

According to Wolf Theiss, the Airports Group Europe from Luxembourg — which is owned by the IFM Global Infrastructure Fund — has released a public mandatory offer to buy 20 to 29.9 percent of the nominal capital of  the Vienna International Airport.

This acquisition was already approved by the take-over commission. Wolf Theiss is advising the seller, the Vienna International Airport.

The Vienna International Airport’s top shareholders are the City of Vienna and the province of Lower Austria where the hub is located, which each own 20 percent, while an employee trust holds 10 percent.

IFM is a Melbourne-based fund that also owns a stake in London Stansted airport and holdings in airports in Melbourne, Perth, and Adelaide, in Australia. The fund plans to offer 80 euros a share, a 30 percent premium over last week’s closing price, for as much as 29.9 percent of the Airport.  According to IFM, the deal will only go ahead if IFM gets at least a 20 percent stake.

According to Bloomberg, “airport assets that promise stable returns for decades have been in demand as investors seek gains higher than those currently offered by bond markets and more stable than those from stocks. The past two years have seen some of the biggest deals in the industry, such as multibillion-dollar bids for hubs in Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo, and a future hub to be built in Istanbul.”

IFM announced its interest in acquiring a minority stake of the Vienna International airport four weeks ago, and its offer has been approved by the take-over commission. According to Wolf Theiss, “IFM intends to position itself as a longterm investor and could spend up to EUR 500 million for the shares. Conditions are that the acquisition contains at least a 20 percent stake of the nominal capital that would be approximately 4.2 Million shares and that the competition authorities agree on the deal without any further additional requirements.”

Wolf Theiss’s team is led by Partner Peter Oberlechner and Counsel Hartwig Kienast.

Integrites is advising the Elfa group of companies (which include the BIO, Dr. Sante, Fresh Juice, Sun Berry, and Green Pharmacy brands) on structuring business in Ukraine.

Elfa’s structuring arises from the necessity of raising over USD 10 million in funding to support its plans to grow in Europe and acquire assets in both Poland and Slovakia.

The Integrites team is led by Counsel Olga Vinglovskaya.

Peter Koves, Senior Partner of Lakatos, Koves and Partners, has been elected Vice President of IBA Bar Issues Commission.

The Bar Issues Commission supports the interests of the IBA’s member organizations and addresses the problems and issues national bar associations encounter in their daily operations, representing and protecting lawyers.

Koves (foto) has an extensive background in bar association management and guidance. In 2008, he was the president of CCBE, the Council of Bars and Law Societies of Europe, the first president to come from one of the former communist countries. And earlier this year, he was re-elected for a second four year term as vice president of the Budapest Bar Association.

As you can see from the new and improved CEE Legal Matters site, we’ve been working hard during the sudden failure brought about by our web host caused by server overload (a good problem to have, but a problem nevertheless). We’ve missed you, and we hope you’ve missed us.

We’ve been listening to the suggestions visitors have made about ways to make the CEE Legal Matters website better and more useful, and we are convinced that the new site — which is both faster and easier to use — is a significant improvement. Although it will be another week or so before the site is at 100%, you’ll notice that it is already easier to negotiate, with clearer categories and a more linear lay-out. The server speed is much faster than before. And you’ll notice links to new features, including the upcoming launch of our Thought Leadership section. In short: We were good before. We’re better now.

And to celebrate our return and improved form, we’re offering you not only a resumption of what we hope you’ll agree is our unprecedented level of news and information about legal matters in Central and Eastern Europe but several additional bonuses:

• First, we’re opening the subscriber-only section of the site three weeks early. Even if you’re not yet a subscriber, you can read all of the October issue’s content immediately.
• Second, we’ll also send a complementary copy of our next print issue to the first 250 of you who sign-up for our free weekly digest. You can do so at this link.
• Finally, if you’re already one of our valued subscribers, we’ve taken the liberty of extending your subscription by an additional issue as our way of saying thanks and apologizing to you for the absence of our up-to-the-minute reporting.

As we approach the first anniversary of CEE Legal Matters, we thank you for making us the leading source of legal information in our unique part of the world, and we hope you’ll stay tuned for exciting announcements in the near future. And we promise to do everything in our power to make sure no one turns out our lights again.  

Allen & Overy advised Barclays Bank PLC, BNP Paribas, and Raiffeisen Bank International as joint arrangers and lead managers on Raffeisenbank’s EUR 500 million issuance of covered bonds, which the firm claims “marks the first public international Czech covered bond issuance, [and] represents a landmark moment for Czech issuers in the international capital markets.”

The covered bonds are issued under the bank’s EUR 5 billion covered bond programme, established in 2012, and listed on the Luxembourg Stock Exchange.

Prague-based Allen & Overy Partner Vaclav Valvoda commented: “In accessing euro liquidity through a previously untapped market, Raiffeisenbank has set a benchmark which will undoubtedly lead the way for further public international issuances of covered bonds by Czech banks in the future.”

Czech banks have been able to issue covered bonds under domestic law in Czech koruna since the early 1990s. In August 2012, the Czech Bond Act was amended, enabling Czech banks to issue euro-denominated covered bonds under English law.  Raiffeisenbank was the first Czech bank to issue international covered bonds under its programme in 2012; these covered bonds were retained and used as collateral for transactions with the European Central Bank and the European Investment Bank.

Partners Sally Onions and Vaclav Valvoda led the Allen & Overy team from London and Prague, with support from Senior Associate Petr Vybiral and Associate Charles Toland.

Jan Pudil, Member of the Board of Directors at Raiffeisenbank, said: “Issuing international covered bonds is a way of obtaining cheaper resources for expansion than on the Czech market, and in a volume we would otherwise not have been able to get.  This is excellent timing for issuing mortgage-backed bonds in euros.  Several weeks ago the ECB, as part of its new quantitative easing programme, announced the details of the Covered Bond Purchase Programme 3.  Even though Raiffeisenbank’s covered bonds are not eligible for the CBPP3, the issuance benefited from it, the interest rate the issuer pays to investors has fallen.  The ECB’s programme covers only issuers in the euro zone, but we can profit from it as well.”

CMS had advised a consortium of the Swietelsky and Leyrer+Graf construction firms on their successful EUR 158 million bid for the public-private partnership project for the Zwettl bypass road. CMS advised the consortium on all legal aspects up until the successful financing in late October.

According to CMS, “the newly established private contractor Umfahrung Zwettl Errichtungs- und Betriebsgesellschaft, formed by the construction companies Swietelsky and Leyrer+Graf, won the contract for project planning, construction and financing of the bypass road as well as for partial maintenance of the road for a contract period of 28 years. The construction services will be provided by ARGE Bau Umfahrung Zwettl, in which Swietelsky, Leyrer+Graf, [and] Strabag hold stakes.

Public procurement law expert Bernt Elsner was in charge of the project and commented on its success, saying, “As one single consortium won the tender for planning, construction, financing and operation, cost-intensive interface management between planning and construction on the one hand and construction and operation on the other hand could be avoided. This entails a higher expenditure for the project, but overall allows for cost and quality optimisation for the entire life cycle. It would certainly make sense to use this concept, which has successfully been applied by the provincial government of Lower Austria already for the third bypass road project, more frequently in Austria in the future.”

CMS Partners Bernt Elsner and Thomas Hamerl advised the consortium on aspects of public procurement law, building contract law, and merger control law, and Partner Gunther Hanslik and Attorney Anna Konopkaas advised on financing matters.

CMS has advised Heta Asset Resolution and Hypo Group Alpe Adria on the sale of a portfolio of non-performing loans worth EUR 168 million to B2Holding.

In this transaction, CMS advised Heta on all legal, regulatory, and tax aspects across Croatia, Serbia, Slovenia, and Montenegro. The parties signed binding documentation in August 2014, and following the approval of relevant local regulators, the transaction closed on November 4, 2014.

Heta is a wind-down entity owned by the Republic of Austria. Its main task is to liquidate the non-performing assets of the former Hypo Alpe-Adria-Bank International, which was nationalized in 2009, in a manner that is as effective and value-preserving as possible. B2Holding is a Norwegian-based company with a strong presence in the Nordic and Baltic markets which mainly deals with the recovery of non-performing loans. The portfolio sold to B2Holding comprises retail loans in Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, and Montenegro.

The international CMS team was led and coordinated by Partner Alexander Rakosi, who was assisted by Associates Lisa Oberlechner and Aakriti Chandihok. They were supported by eleven CMS lawyers from the CEE countries involved in the transaction.

Ashurst has advised DPE Deutsche Private Equity on the financing of the acquisition of Ziegler Group, a manufacturer of technical non-wovens based in Germany and Hungary.

Ziegler products can be found in cushioning material for the furniture industry and insulation for the construction industry, as well as insulation used in the manufacture of glass and carbon fibre reinforced plastics, and, recently, the automotive industry. The sellers of the Group are CODEX Zweite Beteiligungsgesellschaft, Staufen.Invest, and Ralf Stokar from Neuforn.

The parties have agreed not to disclose the purchase price or the amount of financing involved.

DPE is an independent German private equity investment company investing in small and medium-sized enterprises in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. DPE is currently managing total assets of over EUR 600 million. This was the first time Ashurst has advised DPE in a transaction.

The Ashurst team was led by Munich-based banking Partner Bernd Egbers, assisted by Counsel Christiane Bestgen, and Associates Isabell Poller and Thomas Freund, as well as transaction manager Susanne Kasnitz. Partner Heiko Penndorf and Senior Associate Felix Kruger advised on tax aspects.