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The Real Estate team of FORT’s Vilnius office has represented Capital Mill on the acquisition of the Grand Office building in Vilnius. At 81 meters and 21 stories, Grand Office — which opened in May, 2014 — is the 6th tallest building in the city. It is also the first A-energy class office building in Lithuania.

Capital Mill Partner Marko Kull explained his satisfaction in the deal: “We are extremely proud that one of the most valued and energy-efficient office buildings in Vilnius is now in our portfolio. It is a building that holds the first “A” energy class symbol in the Baltics and it the highest office building in our portfolio.” Kull concluded his statement by noting: “I would hereby like to use the opportunity to deliver special thanks to our law firm FORT, whose good advice, expertise and dedication is always surprising.” 

LAWIN has advised the shareholders of Alita, one of the largest alcohol producing groups of companies in Lithuania), in the sale of all their shares to Mineraliniai vandenys, a company controlled by the MG Baltic concern. 

The shareholders — FR&R Invest IGA (a company controlled by Swedbank) and Vytautas Junevicius — have signed an agreement for the sale and purchase of Alita shares with Mineraliniai vandenys and agreed to assign all their shares in the Company, which represent 99.03% of all the shares of the Company (FR&R Invest IGA previously possessed 84.56% of the shares and Junevicius possessed 14.48%). The estimated total value of the transactions is LTL 67.33 million (approximately EUR 19.5 million). The transactions await approval by the Competition Council. 

Following the transaction, Mineraliniai vandenys must announce a mandatory offer for the purchase of the remaining shares of Alita.

Alita was advised by LAWIN Partners Dovile Burgiene and Marius Juonys and lawyer Alina Burlakova. 

Lakatos, Koves and Partners has announced that Bayerische Landesbank’s sale of its Hungarian subsidiary MKB Bank, which was initially reported by CEE Legal Matters on July 25, closed on September 29, 2014.

In return for the purchase price of EUR 55 million, BayernLB will waive EUR 270 million in claims due from MKB. According to a statement released by the Hungarian Ministry for National Economy, “the current owner has agreed to sell 99 percent of MKB shares to the state of Hungary and increase capital by EUR 270 million prior to the transfer.” As a result of the deal, BayernLB will be fulfilling all of the EU’s main requirements regarding disposals of investments, noting in its statement, “and well before the deadline at that.” (The deadline for the disposal is the end of 2015.)

The LKP team was led by Counsel Pal Rahoty and Partner Szabolcs Mestyan, and involved a number of lawyers from across the firm.

Senior lawyer Kaido Kunnapas has joined the LMP Law Firm in Estonia as a Partner, moving over from the Tallinn office of MAQS, where he had been for the past four years.

   

Kaido Kunnapas (Linkedin)

Kunnapas specializes in Tax, Public Procurement, Employment, IP, and Cleantech. 

Kunnapas continues to lecture part time on Civil Procedure at the Tallinn University of Technology, and is also a Member of the Board at MTU Trummiakadeemia. He received his law degree from the University of Tartu.

This summer, MAQS announced it will split in two by the end of the year. Starting January 1, 2015, the firm will continue to operate under the MAQS name only in Sweden, while the Danish part will continue under a new name (to be announced in Autumn) together with the three Baltic Offices in Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania (originally reported on by CEE Legal Matters on June 18, 2014).

DLA Piper and Grama Schwaighofer Vondrak Rechtsanwalte have advised Vienna Capital Partners on its acquisition of a major part of the Hungarian operations of Ringier AG and Axel Springer SE, which were represented by Freshfields from Vienna and Oppenheim from Budapest.

The new publishing group — which immediately becomes one of the largest media houses in Hungary — will operate under the “Mediaworks” brand. VCP will keep the former management of Ringier Hungary as well as the regional management of Axel Springer Hungary on board. The new company is headed by Attila Mihok as CEO and Viktor Katona as CFO. 

Mediaworks has over 700 employees and over 60 media brands. The company expects to generate a turnover over HUF 15 billion (approximately EUR 48.7 million). The main elements of its portfolio are Nemzeti Sport, Hungary’s only sports daily, Vilaggazdasag, a business daily, and Nepszabadag, the market leading broadsheet paper, along with eight regional dailies and numerous magazines in the sports, women, gastronomy, and youth segments. The media house also owns a modern cold-­set printing plant and holds a majority position in Medialog, a distribution company. 

According to a VCP press release, Attila Mihok, the new CEO of Mediaworks Hungary, stated that: “It is a real challenge and a very exciting opportunity for me to continue my career as the CEO of one of Hungary’s most important and the most colorful publishing house. During the past years we had many new ideas and prepared plans that would now come to reality both in digital and in print. A well trained and experienced management formed by former Ringier top-­?management and former regional heads of Axel Springer is a guarantee for success.” 

Heinrich Pecina, the Senior Partner of VCP, was similarly enthusiastic: “I am glad that we closed the acquisition of what is and will be Mediaworks Hungary. With this well diversified portfolio built from many of the most important Hungarian media brands in combination with a young and ambitious management as well as a dedicated workforce I am confident to see Mediaworks to grow and expand in the future.” 

Freshfields team advising Ringier and Axel Springer was led by Managing Partner Willibald Plesser, with Oppenheim advising on Hungarian law and on the Hungarian particularities of the pre-sale re-structuring of the Hungarian operations. 

Andras Posztl and Istvan Szatmary from DLA Piper Budapest acted as the lead counsel for VCP, with Bernd Grama and Wolfgang Lafite of Grama Schwaighofer also advising the company.

Earlier this year, Axel Springer sold a number of regional newspapers, TV program guides, and women’s magazines to Funke Mediengruppe (FMG), reported on by CEE Legal Matters on May 7, 2014 and May 8, 2014.

Sorainen Baltic offices have advised Shiner Macost, owned by international food products entrepreneur Andrey Beskhmelnitskiy, in its EUR 27 million acquisition of Premia’s ice cream and frozen products business in the Baltic States and Russia. Premia is the oldest and largest ice cream producer in Estonia.

Beshmelnitskiy owns Food Union, which unites Rigas piena kombinats and Valmieras piens, the two biggest Latvian dairy companies. Since 2011, Beskhmelnitskiy has invested EUR 33 million in Food Union, including EUR 12 million in the renovation of the ice cream production business. Beskhmelnitskiy operates in Europe, Russia, and Asia and is the founder of Russia’s biggest dairy products company, UNIMILK, which merged with Danone.

According to Beshmelnitskiy, the acquisition of Premia’s ice cream business was aimed at uniting the leading ice cream brands in the region under the Food Union group, which will become the biggest ice cream producer in the Baltics once the transaction is completed. “We aim to bring the Baltic ice cream culture to a new level,” he said. 

According to Katre Kovask, Chairman of the Board of Premia Foods, the transaction involves two of the company’s three business segments, which account for about half of the company’s total turnover (the company continues with its fish and fish products segments). 

The transaction awaits approval of the shareholders of Premia Foods as well as Russian and Latvian competition authorities. Once the transaction is completed, the Premia trademark as well as all the other ice cream and frozen products trademarks used in the Baltics will pass to the new owner. The Tallinn factory will continue to operate and the jobs will be preserved. 

Sorainen performed international legal due diligence in Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania and assisted Shiner Mascot in negotiating the deal and managing the legal assistance process in Russia. The Sorainen team was led by Partner Toomas Prangli, and also included Senior Associate Paul Kunnap, Specialist Counsel Kadri Kallas, and Senior Associates Janis Bite and Liudas Ramanauskas.

CMS Cameron McKenna in Kiev has acted for major oil company Tatneft in relation to an international investment arbitration against Ukraine over what was perceived as an illegal takeover of the oil refinery Ukrtatnafta in 2007.

The arbitral tribunal constituted under 1976 UNCTIRAL Arbitration Rules awarded USD 112 million in damages following the decision that Ukraine had acted unlawfully.  

Senior partner Olexander Martinenko acted as an expert witness on the matters of Ukrainian law in the arbitration under the Russia-Ukraine Bilateral Investment Treaty, supported by senior associate Sergiy Gryshko and lawyer Maksym Bugai. 

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As reported on by CEE Legal Matters on September 25, Grischenko & Partners and King & Spalding represented Ukraine in the arbitration against Tatneft, represented by Cleary Gottlieb Steen Hamilton.

Studnicki Pleszka Cwiakalski Gorski has represented ING TFI before the President of the Office of Competition and Consumer Protection regarding the company’s take-over of the management of the Fundusz Wlasnosnosci Pracowniczej mutual fund from Legg Mason TFI.

Fundusz Wlasnosci Pracowniczej is an investment fund established for the benefit of the employees of the Polish State Railways.

The SPCG team was led by Partner Wawrzyniec Rajchel, with the support of Partner Slawomir Dudzik and attorneys Ewelina Rumak and Tomasz Praschil.

Asters has provided legal advice to the global healthcare leader Eli Lilly and Company on Ukrainian merger control law issues related to Eli Lilly & Co.’s (“Elanco”) USD 5.4 billion acquisition of Novartis’ Animal Health business.  

Upon completion of the acquisition, Elanco will become the second-largest animal health company in terms of global revenue.  

The Asters team that helped Elanco obtain the necessary Competition Authority clearance included Partner Igor Svechkar and attorneys Sergiy Glushchenko, Anastasia Usova, and Igor Smolyak.  

FKA Furtek Komosa Aleksandrowicz has served as special Restructuring Documentation counsel for PKO Bank Polski and Bank BGZ on a Restructuring Agreement and Support Agreement with two members of the PAMAPOL group.

The PAMAPOL group includes a leading producer of ready-made meals and one of the leading producers of tinned and frozen peas and bananas. According to FKA Partner Leszek Rydzerski, “the Restructuring Agreement applies to the revolving credit facilities granted to the Pamapol group by PKO Bank Polski (the biggest Polish bank) and BGZ (a major Polish bank in the agriculture and food sector) and sets out certain other terms and covenants for the entire bank debt and directions for financing of the Pamapol group in the future. In particular, the Restructuring Agreement provides for certain capital contribution, with a view to the planned offering of new shares of Pamapol, with funds committed by Mariusz Szataniak and Pawel Szataniak, key shareholders of Pamapol. These key shareholders (along with the borrowers and certain other subordinated creditors) entered into the Support Agreement with two Banks, whereby, in addition to the subordination of shareholder debts to credit facilities, they assumed certain obligations in the context of a public offering of new shares to be raised from capital markets. In turn, two banks agreed to postpone the final maturity of the revolving credit facilities and, upon completing conditions precedent, to make these credit facilities available in higher limits.” 

The FKA Furtek Komosa Aleksandrowicz team led by Rydzewski and Attorney Bartlomiej Bronisz was responsible for drafting the restructuring documents in accordance with bank guidelines, as well as providing support in negotiations. PAMAPOL was represented by the Stachowicz Ptak law firm, in the persons of Partner Boguslaw Ptak and Attorney Malgorzata Orlik.