International law firm Ashurst advised BlackRock, the world's biggest asset manager, on its £95 million loan to Active Assistance, a care provider owned by specialist healthcare fund manager Montreux Capital.

The debt package will enable Active Assistance to finance its pipeline acquisitions for the foreseeable future, which it will seek to purchase with a mixture of equity and debt. Montreux Capital Management, which purchased Active Assistance in January, is planning to use the firm as its latest base for consolidating the UK's private healthcare sector.

Cravath represented the initial purchasers, led by Goldman Sachs International, in connection with the £265 million 144A/Reg. S high-yield senior secured notes offering of Jewel UK Bondco PLC, a member of the Aurum Group, a leading multi-channel retailer of luxury watches in the United Kingdom. The notes were listed on The International Stock Exchange. The transaction closed on April 18, 2018.

Shearman & Sterling advises Merrill Lynch Pierce Fenner & Smith Inc. and Wells Fargo Securities, LLC as lead arrangers in connection with the proposed unsecured bridge and term loan financings related to Comcast’s offer for Sky, a leading entertainment and communications company in Europe.

The Team

The Shearman & Sterling team below was supported by associate Warren Stapley (London-Finance).

    Jonathan (JD) DeSantis
    Korey Fevzi
    Philip Stopford

Global law firm White & Case LLP has advised the bank syndicate led by Barclays, BNP Paribas, Citigroup, Crédit Agricole CIB, HSBC, Morgan Stanley, Natixis and Société Générale as joint lead managers on Capgemini's €1.1 billion notes offering. This offering is composed of a €600 million 1% notes due 2024 and a €500 million 1.75% notes due 2028.

The net proceeds of the €600 million offering have been used to refinance the existing notes due 2020, issued in 2015, by way of an intermediated tender offer.

Slaughter and May advised Close Brothers Group plc on the establishment of its £1 billion Euro Medium Term Note programme and on the issue under the programme of £250 million 2.750% senior unsecured notes due 2023. The notes are listed and traded on the Regulated Market of the London Stock Exchange.

HSBC Bank plc and The Royal Bank of Scotland plc (trading as NatWest Markets) acted as Joint Lead Managers in respect of the issuance.

Contacts

Ashurst has advised the lenders, Banca IMI S.p.A., BNP Paribas, Cassa Depositi e Prestiti S.p.A., Crédit Agricole Corporate & Investment Bank, ING Bank N.V. and UniCredit S.p.A., on the €1 billion debt refinancing of EF Solare Italia.

Ashurst is advising Interserve on its group refinancing. 

Pursuant to the deal agreed with Interserve's lenders, bond providers and the trustee of its pension scheme, new financing arrangements providing cash facilities of £196.6m plus bonding facilities of up to £94.5m will be put in place subject to satisfaction of certain remaining conditions precedent which are expected to be satisfied before 30 April. These new facilities will mature on 30 September 2021. 

Ropes & Gray has advised Samsonite on its first ever European high yield offering, involving the issuance of €350 million 3.5% Senior Notes due 2026, alongside the syndication and allocation of US$2.143bn of new senior credit facilities.  The structuring of the financing and the related refinancing of the credit facilities provides Samsonite with the flexibility to access the European term loan market in the future.

Davis Polk advised Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation in connection with its reopening of its January 2018 senior debt takedown offering issued under its global medium-term notes program. The reopening consisted of $750 million aggregate principal amount of senior floating-rate notes due 2020 guaranteed by SMBC’s New York branch.

SMBC is one of world’s largest commercial banks by assets.

LONDON – Dechert LLP advised CVC Credit Partners ("CVC") and EQT Credit ("EQT") in connection with GBP 218 million of senior and subordinated financing for Paymentsense.

This is the second round of financing provided to Paymentsense by the two lenders, following participation in the GBP 110 million unitranche facility provided in November 2016.