Hogan Lovells London-based corporate team has advised J.P. Morgan Cazenove, Cenkos Securities and Oakley Capital on their placing of £251 million of new equity in Zegona Communications plc (Zegona) to global institutional investors.

The funds have been used by Zegona, together with its existing cash balances and a new term loan of approximately €270 million, to acquire Telecable, an independent cable telecoms company in northern region of Asturias, Spain, from the Carlyle Group and Liberbank for consideration of €640 million.

Zegona was established by ex-Virgin Media executives including Eamonn O’Hare, the Company’s Chief Executive, with the objective of acquiring businesses in the European Telecommunications, Media and Technology sector with a "Buy-Fix-Sell" strategy. This is the first acquisition made by Zegona since it listed on AIM in March of this year.

The Hogan Lovells team advising was led by London corporate partner Daniel Simons; with partner John Basnage, of counsel Karla Dudek and associate Ben Coleman assisting.

Commenting on the transaction, Daniel Simons, partner, Hogan Lovells said:

"It is less than a year since we met with our clients J.P. Morgan Cazenove, Cenkos Securities and Oakley Capital to discuss the potential for a UK cash shell to deliver on a buy-fix-sell strategy. With Zegona's successful £30 million IPO in the Spring and now the completion of the Telecable deal, we have helped our clients execute two important high profile transactions and, in doing so, have helped Zegona on the way to becoming a leading player in the European telecoms market."