W. Scott Kitchens

• Represented a timber REIT in the negotiation of, and subsequent follow-on investments into, a joint venture to acquire $1.39 billion of timberlands with a consortium of private equity investors.
• Represented a paper manufacturer in the sale of multiple paper mills and facilities with significant operations, including with complex ongoing environmental issues.
• Represented a leading fuel cards payments company in its $690 million acquisition of a Canadian global payments technology company. The transaction won “Foreign Inbound Deal of the Year” from Canadian Dealmakers.
• Represents a privately held leading restaurant franchisor in the start-up and establishment of a food manufacturing business, as well as a logistics and distribution business.
• Represented a leading restaurant franchisor in the negotiation of technology, logistics, and distribution agreements.
• Counsel to several venture capital and private equity firms in investments into portfolio companies and other matters.
• Represented a publicly traded paper and packaging manufacturer in its $1.8 billion acquisition of a consumer packaging business, including mills and converting facilities, in a transaction structured as an UP-C, forming a $6 billion joint venture partnership.
• Represented a leading payments provider in negotiations to establish a closed-loop gift card joint venture with an aggregate value of more than $1 billion.
• Represented a leading packaging and paper provider in more than ten acquisitions of converting manufacturing businesses in multiple bolt-on transactions ranging in value from $30 million to $300 million.
• Represented a leading fuel cards payments company in a $3.4 billion acquisition of a fleet and diversified payments technology company.

Scott Kitchens is a partner in Alston & Bird’s Corporate & Business Transactions Group. He focuses his practice on mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures, equity investments, and complex commercial transactions. He has extensive experience leading transactions in the payments, technology, manufacturing, and distribution industries, especially in the acquisition or sale of privately held targets and divisions of public companies. Additionally, Scott is noted for his pragmatic and cross-functional approach, especially on deals involving complex tax, regulatory, or environmental issues.

Scott received his J.D. in 2007 from Vanderbilt University, where he served as an editor of the Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law, received the Chancellor’s Law Scholarship, and served as president of the Law School Honor Council. He earned his undergraduate degree in finance, summa cum laude, from the University of Mississippi, where he was awarded the Taylor Medal. Scott is an avid outdoorsman and cyclist and is on the board of directors of the Path Foundation, a non-profit focused on developing multiuse trails in Atlanta and the southeastern United States.

Scott is listed in The Best Lawyers in America^© in the areas of Mergers & Acquisitions and Technology.

Bar Admissions

• Georgia

Education

• Vanderbilt University (J.D., 2007)
• University of Mississippi (B.B.A., 2004)