Arcliffe Warsaw has advised Bank Polska Kasa Opieki S.A. on approximately PLN 24,500,000 in financing provided to the Napolo Group for the development of the Nowy Punkt 3 residential complex in Warsaw.
Arcliffe Warsaw Partners Tomasz Jedwabny and Magdalena Brzozowska led the firm’s team.
Arcliffe did not reply to an inquiry about counsel for the borrowers on the deal.
SPCG has advised PKO BP S.A. in connection with loans granted to the Buma Group for the construction of an office building in the Wadowicka 3 complex in Krakow. Act BSWW reportedly advised the Buma Group.
According to SPCG, the Wadowicka 3 office complex consists of three buildings with a total area of approximately 31,200 square meters. The firm reports that it advised Powszechna Kasa Oszczednosci Bank Polski S.A., “in regard to the preparation and negotiating of the credit documentation, in connection with granting a construction loan, investment loan, and working capital loan for the benefit of Buma Inwestor 30 sp. z o.o., a member of the Buma Group, intended for financing and refinancing of construction of an office building within the complex ‘Wadowicka 3’ in Krakow at Wadowicka Street.”
The SPCG team was led by Partner Wawrzyniec Rajchel, Senior Associate Lukasz Przyborowski, and Associate Leszek Czop.
Former CMS Partner Malgorzata Chrusciak has joined Ernst & Young Law in Warsaw as an Of Counsel, focusing on — in her words — “strengthening and developing EY’s regulatory practice for financial institutions.”
At CMS, which she left in June of this year, Chrusciak was Head of the Banking and International Finance Department. She is experienced in advising on investment project financing, syndicated loans, and restructuring transactions involving insolvency risk. She has led various bank formation processes in Poland, advised on the acquisitions of stakes in Polish banks and other financial institutions by foreign investors, and assisted with the mergers of financial institutions, including those of a cross-border nature.
She joined CMS in April 2007, and before that spent nine years with White & Case and six more with various financial institutions, including two with Amerbank and two with Bank Pekao.
Image source: ceo.com.pl
Act BSWW has provided legal services to investment funds managed by Credit Value Investment on the issuance of bonds by Telematics Technologies sp. z o.o. with a total nominal value of approximately PLN 48 million for the purpose of refinancing the participation of MCI. Tech Ventures in Naviexpert sp. z o.o.
Act BSWW also advised on a phantom shares option provided for in the rules agreed by the parties. In addition, Act BSWW compiled documentation related to the bond issue in question, including securities-related documents.
The project was supervised by Managing Partner Piotr Smoluch and the firm’s legal team included Senior Associate Michal Pawlak.
Polish lawyer Bernadeta Kasztelan-Swietlik has joined Gessel as a partner and head of Competition Law.
Gessel describes Kasztelan-Swietlik as “one of Poland’s leading competition law professionals, with extensive experience in cases concerning mergers, competition-inhibiting collusions, abuse of dominant market positions, protection of consumer interests, and unfair exploitation of contracting advantage.”
For the past three years Kasztelan-Swietlik has served as Vice President of the Office of Competition and Consumer Protection, managing the operations of three departments: Concentration Control, Competition Protection, and Legal. Her responsibilities included enforcement of Polish and European competition law and representing the Office before other Polish governmental and public institutions and at the European Union level.
The Gessel team now consists of 50 lawyers, including 12 partners.
Kochanski Zieba & Partners, working alongside Paul Hastings (Europe) LLP, Cuatrecasas, and Loyens & Loeff, has advised a consortium of banks consisting of Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, HSBC, JPMorgan, BNP Paribas, and Lloyds as arrangers in respect to EUR 900 million of senior facilities to finance the acquisition of IPH Group by Brammer — a portfolio company of private equity firm Advent International.
The London office of Weil advised Brammer on both the financing and the acquisition itself. Willkie, Farr & Gallagher advised the sellers — PAI Partners — and Mayer Brown advised the management team.
The combination of Brammer with IPH will create a European distributor of industrial supplies with over EUR 2.1 billion in revenue.
The KZP team was led by Partner Szymon Galkowski and included Partner Tomasz Zalewski, Senior Associate Klaudia Szymanska-Rulkowska, and Associate Edyta Rekawek.
The London-based Weil team was led by Partners Jonathan Wood and included Partners Tom Richards, Stephan Grauke, Jean Beauchataud, Barbara Jagersberger, and Olivier Jauffret.
Polish lawyers Arwid Mednis and Gerard Karp have moved from Wierzbowski Eversheds Sutherland to join PwC Legal in Warsaw.
PwC Legal describes Mednis and Karp as “two of the most recognized experts on personal data protection law, telecommunications law, and intellectual property law on the Polish market.” According to Managing Partner Cezary Zelaznicki, “changes in the business environment taking place as a result of the digital transformation are causing such areas as personal data protection or laws relating to new technologies to become even more important to companies. I am glad that Arwid and Gerard, two of the most talented lawyers on the Polish market, have joined PwC. Their expertise and know-how are a valuable contribution to the competences of our law firm”.
Arwid Mednis, who worked at PwC Legal previously, was a Partner at Wierzbowski Eversheds Sutherland from 2012 until this current return to his old firm. According to PwC Legal, “he represented Poland on the Council of Europe Personal Data Protection Committee in Strasbourg, serving as the Chairman of the Committee for two years. He co-authored the Personal Data Protection Act and has been an active participant in Sejm committees, preparing proposals for legislative changes, for instance in the telecommunications law.
Gerard Karp was at Wierzbowski Eversheds Sutherland for the last eleven years, and spent a year before that at White & Case in Warsaw. During those 12 years, according to PwC Legal, “he has advised the largest national and international entities on key projects regarding personal data protection, e-commerce, IT implementations or for example cloud solutions.”
Dentons has advised Griffin Premium Real Estate on its EUR 160 million acquisition of 100% shares in entities owning three office properties from Echo Polska Properties. Weil advised the sellers on the deal.
Griffin Premium Real Estate is a REIT-type company, with a focus on Poland’s growing office property market. The company has been listed on the Warsaw Stock Exchange since April 2017. GPRE’s portfolio is valued at over EUR 500 million. The properties involved in this most recent deal are the A4 Business Park (a complex of three office buildings in Katowice), Tryton Business House in Gdansk, and the West Gate office building in Wroclaw’s Fabryczna district.
The Dentons team was led by Partner Pawel Debowski, supported by Partner Maciej Ryniewicz and Senior Associate Magdalena Osobka-Morawska.
Weil team was led by Senior Associate Filip Uzieblo, the co-head of the firm’s real estate department, and included Partner Pawel Zdort and Associates Piotr Fedorowicz, Tomasz Bakowski, and Karolina Janus.
Dentons has advised Globalworth, a real estate company focused on property investment in South Eastern Europe and Central and Eastern Europe, on an agreement to acquire a controlling stake in Griffin Premium Real Estate, a company listed on the Warsaw Stock Exchange.
The transaction was carried out by way of a tender offer directed to all shareholders of GPRE. This is Globalworth’s first investment outside of Romania.
According to Dentons, “Globalworth is the leading office investor in the Romanian market. The company has been listed on AIM at the London Stock Exchange since 2013. Globalworth’s portfolio is valued at over EUR 1 billion.”
Dentons lawyers from Warsaw, Amsterdam, and Luxembourg provided advised on the transaction. Pawel Debowski, Chairman of the Europe Real Estate group, led the team. Capital Markets and Mergers and Acquisitions Partners Jakub Celinski and Pawel Grabowski, supported by Senior Associates Michal Wasiak and Piotr Kowalik, were responsible for the tender-related aspects. The Real Estate team consisting of Partners David Dixon and Maciej Ryniewicz and Senior Associate Magdalena Osobka-Morawska advised on real estate aspects of the transaction. The Banking and Finance team advising on the financing of the tender offer was led by Partner Mateusz Toczyski and included Senior Associate Piotr Nerwinski and Associate Katarzyna Blachnio. The Competition team advising on the merger control aspects included Partner Agnieszka Stefanowicz-Baranska, Senior Associate Anna Gulinska, and Associate Maciej Janik.
White & Case has advised REICO Investicni Spolecnost Ceske Sporitelny, a.s., acting for CSNF, which manages the largest Czech market real estate investment fund, on the acquisition of the Galeria Sloneczna in Radom, Poland, from White Star Real Estate. Dentons advised the sellers on the deal.
REICO, a joint-stock company which manages open real estate investment fund, signed the EUR 164 million agreement with White Star Real Estate for the sale of the shares in the company that owns the Radom shopping center on September 26, 2017. White & Case describes the transaction as “one of the largest commercial real estate transactions in Central & Eastern Europe during 2017.”
The White & Case team in Warsaw and Prague which advised on the transaction included Prague Partner Petr Panek, Warsaw Local Partners Michal Matera and Maciej Zalewski, Warsaw Associates Katarzyna Czwartosz-Liber, Michal Plich, Jedrzej Palka, Aneta Urban, and Iwo Malobecki, and Prague Associate Karel Petrzela.
The Dentons team advising White Star was led by Partner Pawel Debowski, the Chairman of Dentons’ European Real Estate Group, who was supported by Senior Associate Jacek Jezierski and Associate Joanna Fidecka.