Category: Austria

CHSH has advised the Acron Group on the sale of the Wien Westbahnhof A3 commercial property at BahnhofCity Wien West to the REAL I.S. Group, which was represented by Eversheds Sutherland.

The transaction was structured as a share deal, and as such, the purchaser acquired all shares held by Acron Wien West A3 S.A. and by Acron Wien West S.a.r.l. The real estate owner was Wien Westbahnhof A3 S.A. & Co OG, a subsidiary of both companies.

The Acron Group, which is headquartered in Zurich, is an investment company specialized in real estate assets. It structures and implements indirect and closed property investments for private individuals and institutional investors in Switzerland, the United States, and Germany.

The CHSH team advising Acron was led by Managing Partner Albert Birkner, working with Attorney Raphaela Zachbauer and Associate Alistair Heschl-Gillespie.

The Eversheds Sutherland team included Munich-based Partners Thomas Ziegler and Carola Rathke and Associates Dominik Sailer and Jennifer Hock; Vienna-based Partner Georg Rohsner and Principal Associate Manuel Boka; and Luxembourg-based Counsel Holger Holle.

Fellner Wratzfeld & Partner has advised the Wienerberger Group on its acquisition of the Brenner brick factory from by Ziegelwerk Brenner, F. Wirth Gesellschaft GmbH, which was represented by Aschmann & Pfandl.

The transaction was approved by Austria’s competition authority in October 2017 and successfully closed on January 10. 2018. 

The factory is based in St. Andra im Lavanttal (Carinthia). 

The FWP consisted of of Partner Markus Fellner and Attorney-at-Law Benedikt Kessler. 

Editor’s Note:  After the story was published, Aschmann & Pfandl confirmed their involvement in the deal. Their team consisted of Partner Christian Pfandl and Lawyer Barbara Schmid. 

Dorda has advised the Sazka Group, a Czech based lottery and gaming group, on the acquisition of shares of Casinos Austria held by Leipnik-Lundenburg Invest Beteiligungs AG and UNIQA Beteiligungs-Holding GmbH.

Following clearance by the relevant national and international regulatory authorities, the transaction was unanimously approved by Casinos Austria AG shareholders.

As a result of the deal, Sazka Group, owned by international investment groups KKCG and EMMA Capital, has increased its indirect stake in Casinos Austria from 11.3% to approximately 34%. The sum of the annual wagers at the companies in which the Sazka Group participates amounts to more than EUR 15 billion.

The Dorda team was led by Partner Jurgen Kittel and consisted of Partners Tibor Varga, Heinrich Kuhnert, and Bernhard Muller, and Associates Christoph Hilkesberger and Lukas Herrmann.

Dorda did not reply to an inquiry about counsel for the sellers.

Herbst Kinsky has advised Miracor Medical Systems GmbH on its cross-border merger and subsequent EUR 25 million financing round with Miracor Medical SA. The latter was represented by Laga, a Belgian law firm.

Miracor Medical Systems is an Austrian medical device company focuses on developing, investigating, and commercializing modern products and technologies for coronary sinus intervention and for support and regeneration of human heart, and Pressure Controlled Intermittent Coronary Sinus Occlusion (PiCSO) technology for the treatment of myocardial deficiencies and chronic heart diseases.

To secure the required funds for business plan realization, the shareholders and members of the Supervisory Board of Miracor decided to relocate the company’s seat and business to Belgium. For this purpose Miracor was merged with its newly incorporated subsidiary, Miracor Medical SA.

Following the merger, strategic investors, as well as co-lead and former investors from Ming Capital of Shenzhen Capital Group, Earlybird, Delta Partners, SHS, BioMedInvest, Peppermint, and new Belgian and Walloon investors from Societe Regionale d’Investissement de Wallonie SA, Societe Federale de Participations et d’Investissement SA, and Meusinvest invested an amount of up to EUR 25 million in equity, debt and refundable cash advances into the company in the course of a series D financing round.

“Although we regret the relocation to Belgium from an Austrian business location perspective, we are very happy for Miracor about this big step,” said Philipp Kinsky, Herbst Kinsky Partner. “The follow-up financing in Belgium will allow Miracor to generate more clinical data, to develop the next-generation products and commercialize PiCSO, in order to ensure that more patients may benefit from PiCSO.”

Herbst Kinsky´s team was led by Partner Philipp Kinsky and Wolfgang Schwackhofer, supported by Carl Walderdorff.

PHH Rechtsanwalte has advised CIDAN Machinery Sweden AB on the acquisition of all shares of Forstner Maschinenbau GmbH.

The CIDAN Group is based in Gotene, Sweden, and sells products under the Goteneds, CIDAN, and Forstner brands, through its subsidiaries in Sweden, Denmark, the U.S., China, and now Austria. CIDAN and Forstner have been cooperating since 2011, when CIDAN began selling Forstner machines in North America through its U.S. subsidiary.

The PHH team included Partner Rainer Kaspar and Associate Philip Rosenauer, as well as Partners Annika Wolf, Julia Peier, Nicolaus Mels-Colloredo, and Associate Antonius Maschietto della Rossa. In addition, the auditing and consulting firm KPMG advised in tax and financial aspects.

PHH did not reply to our inquiry about the deal.

Wolf Theiss Founding Partner Andreas Theiss has received the Golden Medal of Merit for the Republic of Austria, one of the highest state awards in the country.

The award was presented by the President of the Higher Regional Court of Vienna, Gerhard Jelinek.

Waltraud Berger, Vice-President of the Higher Regional Court of Vienna, underlined Theiss’ commitment to Austria in his speech.

Erik Steger, Managing Partner Wolf Theiss, commented: “Andreas Theiss has always been a visionary and he has kept his interest in innovative ideas unchanged,” and added that Theiss’ example has a motivating effect on the entire firm.

This was not Theiss’ first Golden Medal of Merit. In 2017 he received the award for deals in strategic consulting and for his support of international projects. He also received CEE Legal Matters’ Market Maker Award for Austria on June 1, 2017 (as reported by CEE Legal Matters on June 6, 2017).

Brandl & Talos has advised the shareholders of Viennese biotech company Themis Bioscience GmbH on a Series C Financing Round. One of the shareholders, the Global Health Investment Fund, was also advised by DLA Piper, while Themis Bioscience was represented by Herbst Kinsky.

In addition to GHIF, the shareholders included– aws Grunderfonds, OMNES Capital, Ventech, Wellington Partners Life Sciences, and the Global Health Investment Fund.

According to a Brandl & Talos press release, Themis, which develops vaccines, “is considered a leader in the development of an active ingredient against Chikungunya virus, a serious disease with worldwide outbreak potential.” The firm reports that, “with the investment of EUR 10 million, Themis aims to drive the development of clinical and pre-clinical vaccine development programs, including the most advanced vaccine against Chikungunya.”

The Brandl & Talos team was led by Partner Roman Rericha, with the support of Lawyer Markus Arzt.

The DLA Piper team advising the Global Health Investment Fund was led by Partner Jasna Zwitter-Tehovnik, while the Herbst Kinsky team advising Themis Bioscience was led by Partner Florian Steinhart.

Fellner Wratzfeld & Partner has successfully represented the Timber Industry section of the Upper Austrian Economic Chamber in its opposition to an attempt to repeal the membership fee regulation in the Chamber made to the Austrian Constitutional Court.

The Upper Austrian Regional Administrative Court, against which three complaints regarding membership fee decisions had been lodged by timber industry companies, filed an application with the Constitutional Court, requesting that the regulation on Economic Chamber membership fees for the timber industry section be repealed in full or in part. The membership fees levied are, in particular, used to finance the industry section within the Economic Chamber, thus ensuring that it can work efficiently and effectively for its members.

FWP represented the timber industry section Chamber in the Constitutional Court’s review of the regulation, which, accepting FWP’s position, dismissed the application filed by the Upper Austrian Regional Administrative Court in its entirety, thus securing the continued funding of the timber industry’s professional organization and in particular ProHolz, an initiative aimed at promoting the use of wood.

“In addition to having a direct impact on the timber industry,” said FWP Partner Michael Hecht, “the ruling also has significant repercussions for all professional organizations within the Economic Chamber where the most recent reform resulted in a regrouping and merging of different industries and sectors, and shows how membership fees can be used for financing in conformity with the constitution as well as to applicable legislation.” 

The FWP team consisted of Partner Michael Hecht and Associate Josef Peer.

Former Wolf Theiss Partner Benjamin Twardosz and two associates have moved to CHSH Cerha Hempel Spiegelfeld Hlawati in Vienna. 

Twardosz, who is an attorney-at-law and a certified public tax advisor, has been advising national and international businesses on various tax matters for many years. Before joining CHSH, he was a senior attorney at Wolf Theiss for more than eight years, becoming partner in 2012. 

Twardosz joins Partners Johannes Prinz and Peter Knobl in the CHSH tax practice.

“I look forward to strengthening CHSH’s tax practice with my team,” said Twardosz. “At CHSH I’ll be able to focus even more on my own subjects of specialization, like international tax law and corporate tax, transaction taxes, as well as tax litigation and fiscal criminal law.”

CHSH Managing Partner Clemens Hasenauer added that: “We’re very pleased that Benjamin Twardosz, whom we’ve known and appreciated highly for many years from both a personal and professional perspective, has decided to join our team. By this addition we continue to work towards our goal of being one of the leading law firms in Austria in all areas of business law.”  

Schoenherr has advised Zurich-listed Liechtensteinische Landesbank AG on its EUR 185 million acquisition of Semper Constantia Privatbank AG.

As previously reported, the sellers were advised by Fellner Wratzfeld & Partner (as reported by CEE Legal Matters on December 28, 2017).

According to Schoenherr, “the acquisition agreement was signed on December 21, 2017. The purchase price … will be paid partly in cash and partly in LLB shares. The final purchase price will be determined at the end of an earn-out period. The current majority shareholders of Semper Constantia, the Haselsteiner-Familien-Privatstiftung and grosso holding Gesellschaft mbH are planning to acquire a stake of around 6 percent in LLB.”

In addition, Schoenherr reports, “the acquisition is still subject to regulatory and anti-trust approvals and will take place in two steps: In a first step, LLB is expected to complete the acquisition of Semper Constantia in July 2018, including the takeover of customer assets of approximately CHF 17 billion (as of June 30, 2017). This brings the LLB Group’s business volume to over CHF 75 billion. In a second step, Semper Constantia is planned to merge with LLB Oesterreich in September 2018.”

Apart from Liechtenstein and Switzerland, Austria is one of the LLB Group’s three home markets. Since 2009, the Group has been active on the Austrian market with its subsidiary Liechtensteinische Landesbank (Oesterreich) AG, and successfully conducts asset management business.

Semper Constantia Privatbank AG is one of the leading private banks in Austria. It manages net assets of around EUR 15 billion and has 173 employees in Austria. Semper Constantia’s three core businesses include asset management and consulting, custodian bank and fund wrapping business as well as real estate.

The Schoenherr team advising LLB was led by Partner Christian Herbst and consisted primarily of Counsel Maximilian Lang and Partner Volker Weiss.