Gide has advised the private equity management company Omnes Capital on structuring the first fund in France dedicated to investments in high environmental performance public and private buildings, Construction Energie Plus. Launched with a commitment of 50 million euros of the Pro BTP group, with a target size of 100 million euros, the fund’s strategy is to invest in buildings that go one step further than the applicable energy regulations, targeting constructions with a low carbon footprint.

CSA Energy-Infrastructure Switzerland (an investment group of the Credit Suisse Investment Foundation) agreed to acquire a 30% stake in Energie Zürichsee Linth AG (formerly Erdgas Obersee AG) from the city of Rapperswil-Jona (Switzerland). Ergas Obersee AG owns a gas grid and supplies natural gas for industrial customers as well as private households in the Swiss cantons of St. Gallen, Schwyz and Glarus.

Gide has advised Unigestion Asset Management (France) on structuring its fourth dedicated private equity secondary fund, Unigestion Secondary Opportunity IV (USO IV).

Made up of two parallel investment vehicles, one in Luxembourg and the other in France, USO IV aims to acquire and manage a portfolio of interests in investment funds and restructured funds, and to make direct secondary investments. At the first closing of the two investment vehicles, investors committed in excess of EUR 177 million.

King & Wood Mallesons (KWM) has advised on the establishment of Palisade’s Renewable Energy Fund (PREF) which has a mandate to invest approximately A$500m in the Australian renewable energy market, with a key focus on wind and solar assets.

Palisade has established the fund in partnership with the Clean Energy Finance Corporation who committed up to A$100m of funding to enable PREF to acquire and develop over 500MW of renewable projects over the next four years.

King & Wood Mallesons (KWM) has advised on the establishment of Palisade’s Renewable Energy Fund (PREF) which has a mandate to invest approximately A$500m in the Australian renewable energy market, with a key focus on wind and solar assets.

Palisade has established the fund in partnership with the Clean Energy Finance Corporation who committed up to A$100m of funding to enable PREF to acquire and develop over 500MW of renewable projects over the next four years.

London—Dentons has advised Hurricane Energy plc (Hurricane), the oil and gas fractured basement specialist, on a circa £74 million capital raising and open offer to existing shareholders. The funds will be used by Hurricane to advance the development and delineation of its Greater Lancaster Area assets in the North Sea and to secure the development timetable for the EPS phase of its Lancaster asset.

Herbert Smith Freehills has advised Genesis Care Limited on the sale of a significant equity stake in the company to a consortium comprising China Resources and Macquarie Group.

The transaction, which the financial press has reported as giving GenesisCare an enterprise value of around A$1.7 billion, involved the exit of private equity firm KKR from its 45% equity stake (held since 2012).

Simpson Thacher represented EQT Partners in connection with the formation of its first U.S. focused private equity fund, EQT Mid Market U.S. The fund reached a final close in September 2016 with $726 million in commitments. EQT Partners is a leading European alternative assets manager with operations in Europe, the U.S., Greater China and South East Asia.

The Simpson Thacher team consisted of Jason Glover, Gareth Earl, Barrie Covit, Joshua Tod, Steven Klar and Alex Brodkin (Investment Funds); Jonathan Goldstein and Joseph Tootle (Tax); and Jeanne Annarumma (ERISA).

The Bird & Bird VC team recently advised Index Ventures on a USD23 million Series B round financing of SafetyCulture with participation from existing investors.

SafetyCulture was founded by Luke Anear in Townsville (Australia) and is backed by Blackbird Ventures and one of Atlassian's co-founders. SafetyCulture's key product is a workplace safety audit app which was developed in 2012 and has since become the most used safety audit app in the world. Emirates, Qantas, Coles and Uniqlo are some of SafetyCulture's customers.

Ashurst acted as special German counsel to international media group MTG (Modern Times Group) and their subsidiary MTGx, headquartered in Sweden, on the acquisition of 35 per cent of the shares in InnoGames GmbH, a leading global online games developer and publisher, from Eight Roads Ventures and the Company's founders. The investment is in line with MTG's digital strategy to invest in relevant, complementary and scalable digital content and communities. It creates a third digital entertainment vertical for MTGx alongside its esports and MPN businesses.