Category: Estonia

Dechert and Cobalt have advised MidEuropa on its acquisition of the Hobby Hall Group and Pigu UAB. Pohla & Hallmagi and PWC Legal advised the Hobby Hall Group on the sale, while Sorainen advised Pigu.

Pohla & Hallmagi’s team was led by Partner Toivo Viilup.

PwC Legal Estonia’s team was led by Head of M&A Rutt Vark.

Cobalt’s team included, in Estonia, Partners Peeter Kutman and Elo Tamm, Specialist Counsel Elena Hansov, Senior Associate Madis Reppo, and Associate Tiit-Gregor Mets, in Latvia, Partner Guntars Zile and Senior Associate Diana Zepa, and in Lithuania, Partner Elijus Burgis, Managing Associate Deimante Pagiriene, and Senior Associate Justinas Sileika.

Sorainen’s team included Partner Mantas Petkevicius and Associate Mindaugas Baniulis.

Editor’s note: After this article was published, Dechert announced that its team was led by Partner Christopher Field and Senior Associate Ivo Cavrak and included Partner Daniel Hawthorne, Senior Associate Adam Kidane, and Associates and associate Nicolas Kokkinos.

Subsequently, DLA Piper announced that it had advised MCI.PrivateVentures on the sale of Lithuania’s UAB Pigu. The firm’s team was overseen by Warsaw-based Corporate Partner Marta Frackowiak and Senior Associate Michal Gintowt, supported by lawyers in the firm’s Luxembourg office.

Ellex Raidla has advised Bidrento, a start-up company that develops software simplifying the management of rental real estate, on investment into the company by Pipedrive’s founders Timo Rein and Urmas Purde, among others.

According to Ellex, the financing round also included “Peep Vain, Pipedrive’s first investor, Taavi Kotka, an angel investor with a large start-up portfolio, Ivo Magi, the founder of several start-ups, and well-known names in the local real estate sector.”

Ellex’s team included Counsel Antti Perli.

Ellex could not provide more information on the deal.

Ellex Raidla has advised Estonian metal producer Favor AS on its merger with Finnish companies LaserComp Oy, its subsidiary Celermec Oy, and the Ojala Group, to form Leden Group Oy, an industrial company for sheet metal products.

The new group has nearly 500 employees and a total turnover of over EUR 70 million. According to Ellex Raidla, “Leden Group OY offers services in all parts of workmanship and supports customers in product development, product information management, and logistics. The new company has three factories in Finland and two in Estonia.”

Elles Raidla’s team included Partners Risto Vahimets and Martin Maesalu and Associate Georg Kuusik.

Ellex could not provide more information on the deal.

Pohla & Hallmagi has successfully represented the interests of Scania before the Estonian Public Procurement Dispute Resolution Board regarding a procurement process managed by the Tallinn City Transportation titled “Purchase of city buses powered by compressed gas.”

According to Pohla & Hallmagi, “the dispute was regarding the conditions of the tender, which were partly unclear and not proportional and partly distorting competition. The parties, Scania Eesti AS and a company owned by Tallinn City Government, Tallinna Linnatranspordi AS, reached an amicable solution regarding the disputed terms of the tender.”

Pohla & Hallmagi’s team was led by Partner Martin Mannik.

Pohla & Hallmagi has successfully represented the interests of Elektrilabor before the Estonian Public Procurement Dispute Resolution Board regarding a procurement process run by the Narva City Government City Administration titled “Maintenance works of exterior lighting of Narva city 2021-2022.”

According to Pohla & Hallmagi, “Elektrilabor disputed the decision of the Narva City Government not to qualify them in the tender. The Estonian Public Procurement Dispute Resolution Board agreed that this decision was unlawful and annulled it. As a result of this, the tender of Elektrilabor was declared the winning tender and the contract was concluded with between them and the Narva City Government.”

Pohla & Hallmagi’s team was led by Partner Martin Mannik.

Ellex Raidla has advised Estonian box bikes manufacturer KP Cyclery on investments into the company by Comodule OU, among others.

Comodule provides IoT solutions for shared mobility operators and bicycle manufacturers to reduce global environmental pollution and traffic congestion.

KP Cyclery was launched in Denmark in 2014. According to Ellex, the additional funding is planned to be used primarily for the further development, marketing, and increase of inventory of the Nighthawk box bike. “The company aims to launch an electric bicycle in 2022, which will be connected to an electronics module developed and manufactured by Comodule. The module allows individuals to track the location of their bike, maintenance cycles, and information about the bike from a mobile app.”

Ellex’s team included Counsel Antti Perli.

Ellex could not provide more information on the deal.

Pohla & Hallmagi has successfully represented the interests of LTH-Baas before the Tallinn Administrative Court in a public procurement dispute related to a contract to maintain and repair Estonian military vessels.

According to Pohla & Hallmagi, “the public procurement in question was regarding a frame agreement for the maintenance and repair of all Estonian military vessels owned by the Republic of Estonia Centre for Defence Investment for seven years.” According to the firm, as a result of the dispute, LTH-Baas obtained the right to execute the frame agreement.

Pohla & Hallmagi’s team was led by Partner Martin Mannik.

Sorainen has announced that Kaupo Lepasepp is taking over as Country Managing Partner for Estonia.

Lepasepp takes the reigns from Toomas Prangli, who has led the Estonian office for ten years and who, according to Sorainen, “will now fully focus on co-leading the Corporate and M&A practice, as well as the Private Equity & Venture Capital and Startups sector groups in Estonia.”

Lepasepp, who heads the firm’s Competition & Regulatory team in Estonia, has been with Sorainen since 2006, becoming Partner in January 2009. Prior to Sorainen, he spent two years with Aivar Pilv and two years with Teder Glikman & Partnerid. 

Cobalt has advised Respiray on its seed investment round, which included Skype cofounder and DeepMind early investor Jaan Tallinn.

Respiray, which was founded in early 2020, is a Tallinn-based startup producing a wearable virus-killing air purifier According to the Respiray website, the company’s mission “is to transform the way we fight against harmful viruses and bacteria by using cutting-edge UV technology.” According to Cobalt, the company has sealed a preliminary agreement with The Estonian Ministry of Education and Research to pilot devices on teachers in the general education system.

The Cobalt team consisted of Partner Kristel Raidla-Talur, Senior Associate Sven Boettcher, and Assitant Lawyer Johanna Lumiste.

Cobalt declined to offer additional information about the deal.

Pohla & Hallmagi has successfully represented the interests of IDEMIA France in a public procurement dispute before the Estonian Public Procurement Dispute Resolution Board.

According to Pohla & Hallmagi, the dispute concerned a procurement process tendered by the Estonian Ministry of the Interior’s IT and Development Centre department titled “Entry/Exit System face image capture solution in Estonian Border Control Points” for the acquisition of face capture cameras.  According to the firm, as a result of the dispute, the procurement “was annulled by the contracting authority.”

Pohla & Hallmagi’s team was led by Partner Martin Mannik.