Jones Day
Jones Day has promoted 2007 NLSIU Bangalore graduate and former AZB & Partners associate Vinay Kurien to its partnership in Singapore, with effect from 1 January 2020.
“Procter & Gamble has agreed to acquire Merck KGaA’s consumer health unit for 3.4 billion euros ($4.2 billion), giving it vitamin brands such as Seven Seas and greater exposure to Latin American and Asian markets,” reported CNBC. The transaction involved the acquisition of Merck Limited, a listed Indian company, through Procter & Gamble Overseas India B.V, including 3,300 Merck employees. A mandatory tender offer to minority shareholders will be made for the Indian entity.
On April 12, 2017, the Brazilian Central Bank cut the SELIC benchmark interest rate by 1% as inflation for the twelve months ended March 2017 slowed to 4.57% from a high of 10.71% for the twelve month period ended January 2016. Although GDP declined by almost 3.5% in 2016 over the prior year, foreign direct investment into Brazil increased by 6 per cent over the same period to 78.9 billion dollars. Anectodal evidence suggests that M&A activity has increased in Brazil as Brazil`s third largest airline Azul successfully sold 645 million dollars of shares in an initial public offering listing its shares on the New York Stock Exchange and the Sao Paulo BM&F Bovespa.
Link Legal advised digital healthcare platform 1MG Technologies on raising Rs 100 crore ($15m) from Maverick Capital Ventures which was advised by Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas (SAM) and Jones Day. Existing investors also participating in the round were Sequoia Capital which was advised by Themis Associates, Omidyar Network which was advised by Trilegal, and Dumac.
Jones Day Singapore capital markets partner and India head Manoj Bhargava and of counsel Ankit Kashyap will join top US firm Sidley in Singapore, only several months after Sidley’s capital markets partner in Singapore, Prabhat Mehta, moved to the firm’s New York office full time.
Former Jones Day India partner Sumesh Sawhney joined Lakshmikumaran & Sridharan (LKS), as partner, to open up the firm’s office in London.
Jones Day Singapore capital markets partner and India group head Manoj Bhargava and of counsel Ankit Kashyap have both resigned from the firm around a week ago.
AZB & Partners and Clifford Chance Hong Kong advised global investment banking major Goldman Sachs on its $66m (Rs 441 Crore) acquisition of minority stake in Indian hotel investor Samhi Hotels which was advised by Economic Laws Practice (ELP) and Jones Day. Khaitan & Co and Trilegal advised existing investors GTI Capital and IFC
AZB Mumbai partner Nilanjana Singh and senior associate Rinki Ganguly and associate Vijay Manjrekar, and Clifford Chance Hong Kong partner Neeraj Budhwani, senior associates John Koshy and Cheris Wong advised Goldman Sachs.
ELP Mumbai partners Sujjain Talwar and Darshan Upadhyay, associate partner Aakanksha Joshi and associate managers Amruta Kelkar and Kanisha Vora, and Jones Day Singapore partners Dennis Barskyand Karthik Kumar and associate Caitlyn McCarthy advised Samhi.
Khaitan Delhi partners Bharat Anand and Joyjyoti Mishra, principal associate Arjun Rajagopal and associate Nidhi Kilawala advised GTI Capital.
Trilegal Delhi partner Ravindra Bandhakavi, counsel Vaibhav Kothari and senior associate Parnika Malhotra acted for IFC
Jones Day has promoted NLSIU Bangalore 2003 graduate Karthik Kumar to its partnership.
Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas acted for Blackstone on its sale of shares in the Rs 500 crore ($75 m) initial public offer (IPO) of fragrance maker SH Kelkar & Co which was advised by DSK Legal. Khaitan & Co and Jones Day advised the IPO’s book running lead managers JM Financial Institutional Securities and Kotak Mahindra Capital Company.
Gokul Rajan, currently consultant at Citibank in Mumbai, and Nikhil Naredi, Singapore-based associate at Jones Day, are both set to be joining the new firm that will be started by Amarchand Mumbai managing partner Cyril Shroff, as partners to beef up the capital markets practice.
The proposed takeover by Gurgaon-based Apollo Tyres of Ohio-based Cooper Tire & Rubber remained on tenterhooks, as the US company’s bid in a Delaware court to force the deal to close continued unresolved.
Amarchand Mangaldas Delhi and Sullivan Cromwell represented Apollo on the M&A deal, as reported by Legally India in June, with Jones Day having represented Cooper.
Cooper claimed that Apollo was trying to back out of the deal after union and industrial action in the US and China, reported Bloomberg, and that the Indian company agreed that it would use its reasonable best efforts to complete the deal or pay $112.5m in “reverse breakup fees”.
Apollo’s US lawyers wanted Cooper’s case to force a closing thrown out, and claimed in a letter to the court on October 18 that closing conditions to the deal had not been satisfied.
The deal, if completed, would be the largest takeover of an automobile-parts company since 2007.