Two firms were involved in billion-dollar deals, while another assisted with a strategic investment
Over the past week, Mallesons and Corrs Chambers Westgarth confirmed their involvement in billion-dollar transactions while Clifford Chance assisted with a strategic investment.
A team from Mallesons has guided Google parent company Alphabet with a $5.5bn senior notes offering – its first issuance in the Australian debt capital market.
The firm described it as the biggest corporate bond transaction in Australia and the first entry into the market by an AI hyperscaler. The issuance consisted of six tranches with maturities of 3, 5, 10 and 20 years.
“The transaction is a great vote of confidence in the depth and maturity of Australia’s capital markets. As the world’s third-largest bond market, behind the US and Europe, Australia has demonstrated its capacity to support global issuers at significant scale”, Mallesons lead partner Philip Harvey said.
Harvey received support from special counsel Angela Chung, senior associate Hilary Yeoh and solicitor Yifan Jia. The broader debt capital team at Mallesons pitched in as well.
Corrs has helped global private equity firm Warburg Pincus LLC to boost their partnership with alternative investment manager Kio Investment Management and to launch a new venture with extended capital commitments that pitches build-to-rent investments.
The venture also seeks to expand into purpose-built student accommodation projects throughout Australia. The total capital commitment is set to support the development of a rental living portfolio with an end value of $2.5bn, Corrs said.
Corporate partner Adam Foreman took the helm alongside a team including special counsel Marina Pappas and senior associate Ronnie Duan, as well as real estate partner David Ellenby and his team. Also contributing were partners Fadi Khoury, Ian Reynolds, Megan Russell and lawyers from the financial services and funds, banking and finance, and regulatory practices.
Foreman also worked alongside Corrs’ corporate head Sandy Mak to advise Warburg Pincus on its pitched pickup of CreditorWatch holding company Commercial Credit Holdings Limited through scheme of arrangement. The partners received support from special counsel Mary Brady and senior associate Steph Craw; experts from the IP, regulatory, employment, labour and safety, real estate, banking and finance, tax and litigation practices assisted as well.
Clifford Chance Australia managing partner Mark Currell spearheaded the team that advised private equity firm Pemba Capital Partners on its acquisition of a majority stake in wealth advisory firm Hewison Private Wealth.
Through the partnership, Pemba and current Hewison shareholders will extend ownership of Hewison to a broad group of Hewison advisers, per a press release by Pemba. Hewison confirmed that the investment was finalised on 24 August.
Pemba now possesses a strategic, non-operational stake in the business; Hewison will remain independent and be run by the existing leadership. Hewison’s advisory team will be unaffected, according to a press release by Hewison.
“The deal reflects the strong investor appetite for high-quality wealth management businesses and demonstrates the increasing maturity and sophistication of transactions across Australia's advice sector. As private capital continues to seek scalable, high-quality advice platforms, we expect to see further consolidation and strategic investment across the sector”, Currell said.
According to Clifford Chance, the transaction involved complex M&A, financial services regulatory, financing and structuring considerations. Currell was supported by Sarah Jenkins, Tegan Kelly, Nimesh Kularatne and Jae-Ho Kim.
Partner Elizabeth Richmond took point on the deal’s competition aspects with support from Sam Frouhar. Nikki Smythe led the financing aspects with support from Alexander Sorgese and Anjia Zhou.
