Category: Uncategorized

Ecovis Bondar & Bondar has announced it represented Ukraine International Airlines in a dispute with Swissport International and one in the Kiev City Court brought by Boryspil International Airport.

The first revolved around corporate rights in Interavia, one of the leading handling companies providing a comprehensive range of aircraft ground handling services and passenger services at international airports in Ukraine. On 26 November 2014 the Supreme Economic Court of Ukraine reasserted the decision recognizing UIA’s property rights over Interavia. By this decision, the cassation court finalized long-lasting dispute between UIA and Swissport International, which commenced back in 2012. 

The firm also represented UIA in a dispute brought to the Kiev City Commercial Court by Boryspil International Airport. The latter claimed collection of over UAH 37 million of debt for non-contractual ground handling services, supposedly provided by the claimant. On 24 November 2014 the Kiev City Commercial Court fully dismissed Boryspil Airport’s claim to UIA. 

The Ecovis Bondar & Bondar team supporting UIA in both matters case included Oleg Bondar, Managing Partner, and Oleksandr Povar, Senior Associate.

This article is powered by our friends at UJBL. The articles were originally published here and here. 

BDK has advised the Swiss company Newmet International on a successful takeover bid for the acquisition of majority shares in Nissal — the Serbian producer and processor of aluminium and aluminium alloys. The price of the acquisition was not revealed.

Nissal was privatized in 2003, at which time a new cycle of investments into the company’s factory began, improving existing technologies, introducing new ones, and expanding the company’s workforce. According to the Nissal website, the company’s facilities and industrial plants occupies 11 hectares of land, and it now employs 620 workers.

The BDK team was led by Senior Partner Vladimir Dasic and Partner Mirjana Mladenovic. Associate Igor Nikolic prepared the merger filing for the Serbian competition authority, which cleared the transaction in summary (Phase I) proceedings. 

Wolf Theiss has assisted VB Real Estate Services with the sale of its Romanian subsidiary, Immorom Sigma, to PVN Romania and Inprox Bucuresti, both subsidiaries of the bauMax group, for a consideration of EUR 17 million. The buyers were assisted by Noerr.

The transaction was made pursuant to the bauMax group’s exit from the local market and the acquisition of the entire group by the French group Adeo, the owner of the Leroy Merlin retail chain. Adeo will take over the 15 Romanian stores previously operated by bauMax.

The acquisition also meant the restructuring of the whole bauMax group in Romania, involving nine credit institutions, including five banks and four leasing companies and non-banking financial institutions. The transaction was described as “the most complex reorganization process ever to be undertaken by bauMax and will focus on five markets in Central and Eastern Europe.”

The Wolf Theiss team advising VB Real Estate Services on matters of Austrian law was led by Partner Gabriele Etzl and Counsel Hartwig Kienas. In Romania, the transaction was coordinated by Wolf Theiss Senior Attorneys Alexandru Campean, Fabiola Meister, and Attorney Ramona Hromei, all working under the supervision of Partner Ileana Glodeanu. Attorneys Diana Stetiu, Tudor Botea, and Tudor Nistor from Wolf Theiss Romania also provided assistance.

“The transaction raised some interesting challenges, especially from the perspective of the need to reconcile the requirements of all the involved parties and at the same time to obtain a viable final structure that is achievable from a practical point of view. Our common objective, successfully achieved, was to ensure that the transaction was finalized and effective starting with November 18, 2014, time being of the essence” explained Glodeanu.

From Noerr, the transaction was led by Mihai Macelaru, who coordinates the firm’s M&A department in Bucharest. Macelaru was assisted by Attorneys Magdalena Lupoi and Luiza Bedros. The Noerr team was supervised by Partner Rusandra Sandu.

In late October TaylorWessing e|n|w|c hired Brigitte Sammer as a Partner, then last week announced that Stefan Turic has joined the firm’s Dispute Resolution Team as well.

Sammer worked for TaylorWessing e|n|w|c from 1998-2002, though still an Associate when she left. She returns as a Partner in the Vienna office’s CEE Corporate / M&A Team, where she will focus on Association Law. TaylorWessing e|n|w|c Managing Partner and Head of Corporate Raimund Cancola explains that: “across all industries, the association will gain importance in the future as an instrument in company structures. The number of associations has tripled in the last 50 years. Currently, in Austria, there are over more than 100,000 registered associations, not only in the areas of sports and culture. We are therefore particularly happy to have Brigitte Sammer, an absolute expert in this field, with us,” 

Sammer will also support the firm’s Employment team in Corporate Employment matters.

She looks forward to her work with TaylorWessing e|n|w|c: “Firstly, I look forward to contributing my expertise into an international firm, and to build up a new product cross-border. Secondly, it’s twice as much fun when one already knows a large part of the team.” 

Turic, an attorney since 2011, worked at several firms after his studies – most recently at Fellner Wratzfeld & Partner —  in the area of procedural law. He has gathered particular experience in the areas of financing and restructuring litigation, real estate litigation, and disputes regarding commercial agency law. He looks forward to the opportunities to expand his practice across the Austrian border: “It will be exciting to delve into cross-border work. Procedural law will become much richer and multi-faceted.”

Wolfgang Kapek, CEE Head of Dispute Resolution at TaylorWessing e|n|w|c, said: “We are happy to have won Stefan Turic as an experienced partner in procedural law, especially since we wanted to expand our team due to the greater demand in this area. We are more and more involved with international cases in particular – both CEE as well as other countries, in which Taylor Wessing is represented. Stefan Turic will also support us in these cases.” 

White & Case has advised Synthos, one of the largest European producers of chemical raw materials, on the issuance of senior notes with a total value of EUR 350 million.

The notes have been issued by Synthos Finance AB (publ), a special purpose vehicle and a wholly owned subsidiary of Synthos with a registered office in Stockholm.

According to the firm, the bonds were issued under a private offer to selected institutional investors, pursuant to Regulation S and Regulation 144A of the U.S. Securities Act of 1933. The agreement on the conditions of the bond issue is governed by the laws of the State of New York, USA. The bonds are unsecured with a stable interest rate of 4.00 percent per annum reaching final maturity in 2021. The bonds are listed on the Irish Stock Exchange and admitted for trade on the Global Exchange Market.

“This was a complex project involving Polish, Swedish, Czech, and American law, bringing together several teams of White & Case lawyers, from the capital markets practice as well as banking and finance, acting simultaneously in several of our offices,” said White & Case Partner Andrzej Sutkowski, who coordinated Synthos’ issuance of bonds. 

The participating banks included BNP Paribas, Citigroup Global Markets Limited, Deutsche Bank AG, London Branch, Banco Santander S.A., ING Bank N.V., London Branch, Powszechna Kasa Oszczednosci Bank Polski S.A. and UniCredit Bank AG.

The White & Case team in Warsaw advising Synthos was led by Partners Marcin Studniarek and Andrzej Sutkowski, with support from Local Partner Tomasz Ostrowski and Associates Bartosz Smardzewski, Monika Duzynska, Aneta Urban, and Sylwia Opiatowska; Partners Rob Mathews and Jill Concannon and Associates Annie Serafim and Jennifer Reiss in London; Partner Carl Hugo Parment and Associates Michael Bark-Jones, Petter Alberts, and Emil Bjorkhem in Stockholm; Local Partner Eva Svobodova, Counsel David Ilczyszyn, and Associate Ondrej Barton in Prague; and Partners John Donovan and Gregory Little in New York.

White & Case has also recently advised on bond issuances by P4 (the Play operator), PZU, and TVN.

Image source: synthosgroup.com

DLA Piper has advised the TRINFICO investment group on the purchase of two office towers located in the Airport City of St. Petersburg. The two properties were sold for EUR 70 million to the Russian Blagosostoyanie real estate fund, which TRINFICO manages. Dentons advised Avielen on the deal.

The asset deal was initially announced in February of 2014, but according to DLA Piper was only recently completed. The vendor was ZAO AVIELEN A.G, a joint venture between the Austrian real estate developer Warimpex (55%), the CA Immo Group (25%), and UBM (10%). The two buildings – Jupiter 1 and Jupiter 2 – offer roughly 16,800 square meters of space in total and have been let out to subsidiaries of a major Russian energy group for nearly two years.

The TRINFICO Investment Group is an independent financial services provider headquartered in Moscow. The international DLA Piper team included Christoph Mager and Elisabeth Stichmann in Vienna, Ksenia Ilina and Jan Barber in Munich, and Mukhamed Evloev, Lyubov Pascaru, Sergey Koltchin, Maryana Kabakova, and Julia Zenova in Moscow.

“Successfully completed deals are by no means a given under the current difficult conditions,” Mager said. “All the more I am pleased for our client that this purchase could be finalized.” 

The Dentons team advising Avielen was led by St. Petersburg-based Partner Karina Chichkanova, assisted by Of Counsels Oleg Lovtsov and Olga Uriupinskaya and Associates Arina Dovzhenko, Tair Suleymanov, and Svetlana Shlyunko.

Greenberg Traurig has advised Penta Investments, one of the major shareholder of Empik Media & Fashion (EMF), in connection with a project regarding changes to EMF’s terms of debt. The project — which ended on November 24th — resulted in a financing extension for EMF. The estimated value of the transaction was PLN 1.2 billion (approximately EUR 287.2 million).

Greenberg Traurig advised on the repayment by EMF of the whole debt amount under bonds issued by EMF as a tranche 6/2010, with a total value of PLN 249.5 million, by using funds derived from an issuance of: (a) unsecured bearer bonds in PLN series 2/2014, 3/2014 and 4/2014 with a total nominal value of PLN 128.8 million; and (b) unsecured registered bonds in EUR series SH/2014 with a total nominal value of EUR 37.96 million. It also ensured the grant of an unsecured loan in the amount equal to the EUR equivalent of PLN 100 million to EMF by affiliates of the major shareholders of the company (i.e., Penta Investments Limited and Eastbridge). The purpose of the loan was partial repayment of existing debt and improvement of EMF’s cash flow. Finally, the firm concluded an agreement amending the terms of loan agreements and bilateral agreements with creditors between EMF and its selected subsidiaries, financial institutions and entities affiliated with Penta Investments Limited and Eastbridge by determining, among others, the ranking of creditors’ claims.

The Greenberg Traurig team was led by Managing Partner Jaroslaw Grzesiak, with Partners Andrzej Wysokinski and Rafal Sienski and Local Partner Aleksander Janiszewski, supported by Associates Paulina Kimla-Kaczorowska and Magdalena Bachleda-Ksiedzular.

Gide Kyiv advised the European Investment Bank (EIB) on a EUR 50 million secured loan to Astarta Kyiv, an agricultural holding specializing in sugar production in Ukraine.

The loan was to finance the construction of silos and elevators, secured by various moveable and immoveable assets. Gide Loyrette Nouel’s team was led by senior associate Igor Krasovskiy under supervision of partner Bertrand Barrier.

This article is powered by our friends at UJBL. The article was originally published here. 

Borenius has advised the Darby Converging Europe Fund III — the private equity arm of Franklin Templeton Investments — on its acquisition of a majority equity interest in Storent Holding, one of the leading Latvian construction and industrial equipment rental companies.  

Borenius acted as leading legal advisor coordinating and managing the transaction process in the Baltics and Scandinavia. Borenius performed legal due diligence of Storent group companies, received clearance from competition authorities, represented Darby’s interests in negotiations, and drafted the share purchase agreement, shareholders agreement, and related transaction documents.

The Borenius team consisted of Partner Lauris Liepa and Associates Zane Bule and Ieva Sefere.

DLA Piper has “demerged” from its Turkish partner, Yuksel Karkin Kucuk, which will now operate independently, as it did before the two firms tied up in 2010.

According to a formal statement released by DLA Piper: “Since 2010, DLA Piper has had an exclusive alliance with YKK, a leading Turkish law firm. This has been an immensely  successful period in Turkey for both firms but following discussions over the last year, both parties have concluded that their respective ambitions and strategies can be better delivered separately, with YKK and DLA Piper continuing to recognize the advantages of collaborating with each other and building on the close working relationships already established. Accordingly, with effect from 1 November 2014, both parties have agreed to move to a less formal relationship. Turkey remains a key legal market for the firm and one where we have significant understanding and experience; we are confident that we can continue to serve our global clients there in an efficient and rigorous manner.”

In an exclusive conversation with CEE Legal Matters, Cuneyt Yuksel, the Co-Managing Partner of YKK, insisted that his firm’s separation from DLA Piper was amicable, carefully managed, and positive. He pointed out that YKK has 108 lawyers, making it far and away the largest firm in the country, and explained that, “we thought it would be better for us to be independent … but we’re very good friends, and we discussed everything, and in the separation agreement there’s a priority to work together. But now we can work with other firms as well.”

Nick Bell, DLA Piper’s Head of Communications, EMEA & Asia Pacific, told CEE Legal Matters: “In terms of our plans, the firm’s FAP in Turkey will be closed at the end of the calendar year and we expect those lawyers currently located in Turkey to transfer to YKK.” Yuksel confirmed that the DLA Piper partners in Turkey — Jonathan Clarke and Tamsyn Mileham — will transition over to his firm.

Image source: hans engbers / Shutterstock.com