Mergers and acquisitions, equity capital markets and corporate governance.
Understanding the economic and commercial rationale behind every transaction and providing the best legal solutions to help achieve your business objectives is at the heart of our corporate team’s approach.
Our corporate lawyers have represented participants in some of Australia’s largest transactions and provided advice on the implementation of company transforming deals, specialising in Mergers & Acquisitions (M&A) and Equity Capital Markets (ECM).
We are supported by specialist finance, tax, competition, property and IP lawyers who can assist in the resolution of a range of issues related to complex corporate and M&A matters, including ACCC merger clearances, transaction structuring, tax rulings, negotiation of acquisition finance facilities and due diligence.
Leading corporations work with us on a full range of M&A transactions, from innovative public takeover bids and major private-treaty acquisitions and disposals, to privatisations and complex court approved mergers by scheme of arrangement and large scale due diligence exercises. Our experience extends to stapling arrangements and asset transfer schemes, as well as the tax, competition and financing aspects of merger and acquisition deals.
Our industry experience is broad, covering a range of sectors and industries including energy and resources, agribusiness, financial services, media, transport, wine and other beverages, building products and consumer products.
We regularly engage with regulators (ASIC, ASX and the Takeovers Panel) and are actively involved in industry bodies and contribute to leading edge developments in mergers and acquisitions.
We represent arrangers, issuers and underwriters in IPOs, rights issues, hybrid security issues and the development of a wide range of structured financial products. We can assist with the preparation of prospectuses and product disclosure statements, as well as all underlying documentation. We also undertake due diligence and the preparation of information memoranda for private offerings including private equity, seed capital and unregistered managed investment schemes.
Our expertise includes liaison with ASIC and ASX in regulatory matters, including innovative relief applications.
Acting for HumanForce, an Accel-KKR portfolio company, on its acquisition of intelliHRLimited (ASX:IHR), an HR software platform, by way of scheme of arrangement and subsequently by way of a concurrent on-market contested takeover bid (2023).
Acting for Acclivis in relation to its acquisition of Zed Technologies, a cloud-based radiology software business (2022).
Acting for its portfolio company, Z Software, in the acquisition of Medi-Map, a medication management software company (2023).
Acting for Advent on its acquisition of a majority stake in the Australian luxury fashion brand ZIMMERMANN, which operates retail stores in Australia, the US, UK, Europe and China, as well as being represented in prestigious department stores and luxury retailers worldwide (2023).
Acting for Alpine Software Group, a portfolio company of Alpine Investors, on its acquisition of OSINT Combine and NexusXplore (2023).
Acting in relation to the acquisition by portfolio company, Aplos, of non-profit fundraising platform, Raisely (2023).
Advised Ascertain on its investment in Eyetelligence, a Melbourne-based healthtech company which uses advanced artificial intelligence technology and retinal imaging to screen for eye and systemic diseases.
Advising on its A$697 million acquisition of Barminco, creating Australia's second largest mining services company by revenue.
Advised on the acquisition of mining services supplier, Mainetec Pty Ltd.
Acted on the acquisition of a majority interest in Only About Children, a leading early childhood education and development business.
Advised on the Australian law aspects of its US$200 million acquisition of Liag Argentina, one of the largest agricultural producers in Latin America, from Kahlbetzer Australia.
Advising on the acquisition of PageUp from its founders, Accel-KKR Growth Capital Partners and Accel-KKR Members Fund.
Advising on the acquisition of News Corporation publications - Inside Out, Country Style and HomeLife.com.au.
Advising on its acquisition of 100% of the shares in Catalent Australia Holding Pty Ltd, moving Blackmores into the manufacturing space.
Advised Bowen Coking Coal on the acquisition of numerous coal assets, including the acquisition of New Hope’s interest in the New Lenton Joint Venture (comprising the New Lenton coal project and the Burton coal mine and related on-site infrastructure).
Advised CleanSight on its on-sale to Tilt Renewables, of 50% of the 1.2GW Forest Wind project in Queensland.
Advised a confidential bidder on its multibillion dollar bid to acquire BHP’s 80% interest in BHP Mitsui Coal (Poitrel and South Walker Creek operations, Red Mountain Infrastructure and the Wards Well project), BHP’s 33% interest in the Cerrejón coal mine and BHP’s Mt Arthur coal mine.
Acted on the A$1.13 billion divestment of its Australian real estate/hotel projects to AWH Investment Group, part of the Yuhu Group.
Advising the sellers of DAOU Vineyards on its sale to Treasury Wine Estates Ltd (ASX: TWE) in a deal worth up to US$1 billion (A$1.6 billion).
Acting in relation to its acquisition of Anti Corrosion Technology (2022).
Advised on ); its acquisition of cloud-based workforce management and payroll platform, KeyPay.
Acting for BPEA Private Equity Fund VIII (“EQT”) on its acquisition of VetPartners, the leading provider of veterinary and animal health services in Australia and New Zealand.
Acting for Fireblocks (a platform that protects digital assets in transit) on the acquisition of BlockFold, a Melbourne-based start-up that helps financial institutions build blockchain-based systems (2023).
Advised on its scheme of arrangement with PVH Corp, worth A$306 million.
Acting for Veeam Software (an Insight portfolio company) on its acquisition of Cirrus, a SaaS backup solution for cloud workloads, allowing users to send backups to external storage repositories currently managed by Microsoft Azure (2023).
Acting for Zone & Co (an Insight portfolio company) in relation to its acquisition of Infinet Cloud, a NetSuite partner specialising in international Payroll & Employee Centric solutions (2023).
Acting for the sellers on the acquisition by Close the Loop Inc (ASX:CLG) of ISP Tek Services and Captive Trade, two U.S.-based electronics refurbishing and trading companies (2023).
Advised on various investments totalling over A$1 billion to date, including into simPro, AroFlo and Cyara Solutions (Australia’s equal largest venture capital funding on record as at 2022).
Acting for Lacima, which provides technology solutions for trading and risk management in energy and commodities markets trading businesses, on its sale to the European Energy Exchange (EEX), which is part of the Deutsche Börse (2022).
Acting in relation to its acquisitions of IVF providers, Adora Fertility (2022) and Genea (2022).
Acting in relation to its divestment of BMX Holdco (Biomedx), a leading global provider of fertility products that automate and standardize lab workflow for IVF clinics (2023).
Acting in relation to its divestment of Biomedx (2023), its acquisitions of Simplyai (2023), Data Addiction (2023), and Genea Fertility of Fertility SA (2023).
Advised Magnetic Rail Group and its shareholders (M Infrastructure and ABL) on the $1 billion acquisition of the OneRail East Coast Rail business from Aurizon.
Advised on the acquisition of a 10% interest in mining technology subsidiary idoba by Sumitomo Corporation.
Advised on Sumitomo Corporation's acquisition of a 10% stake in idoba at an enterprise value of A$80 million.
Advised PM Capital Global Opportunities Fund (ASX:PGF) on its contested proposed merger with PM Capital Asian Opportunities Fund (ASX:PAF) (2022).
Advising on its acquisition of Micromine and on its takeover of Nitro Software.
Acting in the high profile $600m contested takeover bid for Nitro Software (ASX:NTO) (2023).
Acting in the high profile bid for Tyro Payments Limited (ASX:TYR), a listed payments provider of merchant credit, debit and EFTPOS services (2023).
Acting for Potentia in relation to its take-private acquisition of Nitro Software (ASX:NTO), a document productivity software company, in an on–market takeover (2023).
Acting for Qantas Airways Limited (ASX:QAN) in its proposed merger with Alliance Services Limited (ASX:AQZ) by way of a scheme of arrangement (2022/23).
Acting for Quantum Health Group Limited (ASX:QTM) in its merger with Paragon Care Limited (ASX:PGC) by way of a scheme of arrangement (2022).
Acted on its initial acquisition of a 30% interest in Mitchell Water and taking of a call option to acquire the remaining 70% interest.
Acting for Actionstep, a cloud-based legal practice management platform, and portfolio company of Serent Capital, on its acquisition of legal software businesses, LawMaster (2022) and FilePro (2023).
Advising on its acquisition of SAI360 from Barings Private Equity Asia (BPEA) EQT.
Acted for StraxCorp on merger with CurveBeam AI LLC (2022).
Acting for Vector Capital Management and its portfolio company MoxiWorks on its acquisition of ActivePipe, a real estate tech offering providing email and marketing automation solutions (2022).
Advised on a number of M&A transactions in the waste, water and energy sectors, including the sale of its interest in Integrated Waste Services (IWS), a sustainable waste management business with facilities in South Australia, to First Sentier Investors.
Advising ImpediMed (ASX:IPD) on its private placement to new and existing sophisticated and professional investors and SPP. (2023)
Advising CurveBeam AI Limited on its IPO and listing on ASX. (2023)
Advising TSX-listed Novo Resources Corp. on its IPO and listing on ASX. (2023)
Advising EBR Systems, Inc on its private placement and security purchase plan of CDIs to raise approximately A$35 million. (2023)
Advising Visioneering Technologies, Inc. (ASX: VTI) on its pro-rata non-renounceable rights offering. (2023)
Advising Rubric Capital on its PIPE investment in Mayne Pharma Group (ASX:MYX). (2022)
Advising Imricor Medical, Inc. (ASX:IMR) on its convertible note financing to The KAHR Foundation. (2022)
Advising Cooper Energy Limited (ASX:COE) on a fully underwritten A$244 million equity raising comprising A$84 million placement and A$160 million accelerated entitlement offer. (2022)
Advising Arafura Rare Earths Limited (ASX: ARU) on its $141m placement and share purchase plan which raised funds to progress development of the Nolans NdPr Project in the Northern Territory. (2022)
Advising CurveBeam AI Limited on its pre-IPO convertible note financing, raising $25 million. (2022)
Advising Bionomics Limited (ASX:BNO) on a NASDAQ listing and US IPO (US$23 million). (2021)
Advising EBR Systems, Inc on successful IPO and listing of CDIs on the ASX to raise A$110 million. (2021)
Advising Arafura Rare Earths Limited (ASX: ARU) on its private placement and security purchase plan of CDIs to raise approximately A$40 million. (2021)
Advising Laybuy Group Holdings Limited (ASX:LBY) on IPO and listing on ASX. (2020)
Advising investors including D.E. Shaw Group, Senrigan Capital and commodities trader Noble Resources on restructures of A$132 million of convertible notes in Sundance Resources. (2019 and 2021)
Acting on its A$250 million accelerated non renounceable entitlement offer (fully underwritten by Deutsche Bank and UBS) in connection with its A$697 million acquisition of Barminco from private equity interests. Also advised on the block trades by Ronald Sayers and Peter Bartlett of their shareholdings in Ausdrill for approximately A$150 million. (2018)
Acting on its Series B (2022) investments in solar tech business, 5B.
Acting on their Series A investment in Zepto, a real-time account-to-account merchant payments platform (2022).
Advising on the sale of the Aerocare business to Swissport, owned by Chinese conglomerate HNA.
Advised on the Australian aspects of the acquisition by Accel-KKR of approximately 35% of the issued share capital in Human Force.
Series A investment in Humanforce Holdings Pty Ltd.
Advising on the restructure of GensisCare and its sell down of shares in GensisCare to KKR.
Advising on its partial sale of Marlin Brands to funds managed by Oaktree Capital Management and Alceon.
Advised the Australian human resources and payroll software as a service (SaaS) company on: its $181m Series E extension equity capital raising round, valuing the company beyond the milestone billion-dollar “unicorn” valuation mark at $1.25 billion (Australian Investment Council 2022 Venture Capital Investment Winner).
Advising Gauge Capital on its acquisition of Loving Tan.
Acting on its Series A investment in Sicona Battery Technologies (2023).
Acted on all aspects of its acquisition of 60% of the 2XU group, having previously advised on L Catterton’s initial investment in 2XU.
Acting for Merchant Wealth Partners on its minority investments in MBS Insurance and Janus Financial.
Advised on all legal aspects of its investment in Phocas Limited.
Advised on its acquisition of Micromine, an exploration and mine design solution.
Advised the Australian molecular diagnostics company on its $26 million capital raising from a range of investors including Northpond Ventures, Platinum Asset Management and Tenmile.
Advised on all aspects of its US$1.6 billion divestment of its interest in project Ichthys to INPEX.
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Johnson Winter Slattery advised Archer Capital on the ~A$820 million sale of illion to Experian, bringing together two of Australia's three consumer credit bureaux. JWS advised on all legal aspects...
Usually who serves on the board of a listed company is a matter for the company itself and others, including the courts, only rarely intervene. That’s why the Takeovers Panel’s order requiring...