Mergers & Acquisitions
You hire M&A lawyers to facilitate deals, not hold them up. Our team carefully assesses risk, and structures and negotiates your transactions to position you best. However, we don’t give you unnecessary, protracted updates on minor details. We maximize time by ensuring clear communication, lean staffing, and a keen understanding of your long-term objectives.
Languages
We have one of the country’s most experienced groups of M&A attorneys, advising businesses every day on how to access the market to achieve their strategic and liquidity objectives. With over 125 M&A attorneys throughout our firm, we have the depth to assemble a complete team of lawyers that can react quickly to solve the most critical challenges facing your business today. We serve clients ranging from Fortune 500 corporations, closely held companies, private equity sponsors, investment banks and special committees.
Experience
Alston & Bird M&A attorneys have extensive experience advising clients engaged in a full range of domestic and cross-border public and private transactions, including acquisitions and divestitures, mergers, leveraged buyouts, going-private transactions, strategic alliances and joint ventures. We have developed significant industry-specific knowledge in many cutting-edge industries, including:
- biotechnology;
- consumer products and services;
- energy;
- financial services;
- health care;
- insurance; and
- technology and telecommunications
Accolades
Our M&A practice is consistently among the most active in the nation.
- Top 25 “M&A Advisers in Announced Deals with a Value of $100 Million or More,” based on number of deals in 2019. (The Deal)
- Ranked in the top 20, based on the number of deals, in the M&A category “US Announced Deals” for 2019. (Factset)
- Ranked #4 among U.S. law firms representing financial advisors in M&A activity for 2019. (Corporate Control Alert)
- Nationally ranked in Tier 1 for Mergers & Acquisitions Law since 2013. (U.S. News – Best Lawyers® “Best Law Firms”)
Bringing Value to Our Clients
We operate based on two fundamental principles: first, that a client hires us to be facilitators, not roadblocks; and second, that we are there to protect the value of our client’s deal. We focus on our client’s business and long-term objectives and ascertain the elements of value in the deal for our client. We take a fully integrated approach to assessing the risks that affect value, negotiate to minimize those risks and structure the transaction so that the objectives are accomplished.
- Represented AGC Networks Limited, a global IT solutions provider, in its $118.7 million acquisition of Black Box Corporation.
- Represented American Proteins in the sale of its poultry rendering and blending assets to Tyson Foods for $850 million.
- Represented CatchMark Timber Trust in its acquisition of 1.1 million acres of Crown Pine East Texas timberlands for approximately $1.39 billion in a joint venture with a consortium of institutional investors.
- Represented CommScope Holding Company Inc. in its $3 billion purchase of TE Connectivity’s Broadband Network Solutions unit, consisting of telecom, enterprise, and wireless businesses.
- Represented Cox Automotive in its acquisition of Clutch Technologies, a vehicle subscription business.
- Represented Credit Suisse, the financial advisor to Pinnacle Foods, in Conagra Brands’ acquisition of Pinnacle Foods in a cash and stock merger valued at $10.9 billion.
- Represented First Cash Financial Services Inc., an international operator of retail pawn shops, in its merger of equals with Cash America International Inc. with a combined enterprise value of approximately $3 billion. The transaction creates the largest combined retail pawn store operator in the U.S. and Latin America, with total annual revenue of approximately $1.8 billion and more than 2,000 locations across four countries.
- Represented FLEETCOR Technologies Inc., a leading global provider of fuel cards and workforce payment products to businesses, in its $3.45 billion acquisition of Comdata Inc.
- Represented Grain Management LLC, a leading private equity firm focused on the communications sector, in its acquisition of Great Plains Communications, the largest privately owned telecommunications provider in Nebraska.
- For more than 10 years, we have represented Graphic Packaging International, a leading provider of paperboard packaging solutions to multinational and other consumer products companies, in more than a dozen M&A transactions, including its acquisition of assets from Delta Natural Kraft Inc.; its acquisition of substantially all of the assets of Sierra Pacific Packaging Inc.; several dispositions of non-core businesses; its merger agreement with Altivity Packaging LLC, a paperboard packaging company whose majority interest is held by the private equity group TPG Capital; and its $6 billion combination with the North America consumer packaging business of International Paper Company.
- Represented LinQuest Corporation, a federal government contractor and leading provider of space systems technology solutions to the U.S. defense and intelligence communities, in the sale of a controlling interest to Madison Dearborn Partners and CoVant Management.
- Represented Osaka, Japan-based Nippon Paint in its acquisition of Dunn-Edwards Corporation, one of the U.S.’s largest independent manufacturers of architectural, industrial, and high-performance paints.
- Represented STS Aviation Group, a global aviation solutions company, in the sale of a majority interest in the company to Greenbriar Equity Group, L.P.
- Represented Synovus Financial Corporation in its $2.9 billion acquisition of Florida-based FCB Financial Holdings Inc. in the second-largest bank deal in 2018 at time of announcement, based on value.
- Represented Turner Broadcasting, a Time Warner subsidiary and owner of CNN, Turner Sports, TNT, and Cartoon Network, in its sale of the broadcast assets of WPCH-TV to Meredith Corp. WPCH-TV is the former “Superstation WTBS” founded by Ted Turner.
- Represented Uniti Fiber Holdings in its $54 million acquisition of Information Transport Solutions, a technology solutions provider, primarily for educational institutions.
- Represented the Special Committee of the Board of Directors of ZAIS Group Holdings, an investment advisory and asset management firm, in a going-private transaction.
Highlights
BancorpSouth Bank to Merge with Cadence Bancorporation
Alston & Bird client BancorpSouth Bank has announced a definitive agreement to combine with Cadence Bancorporation, the parent company of Cadence Bank, N.A., in an all-stock deal that will create a combined company with a market value of $6 billion.
Renk to Acquire Combat Propulsion Systems Businesses from L3Harris for $400 Million
Alston & Bird client Renk AG has signed a definitive agreement to acquire the Combat Propulsion Systems (CPS) and Magnet-Motor GmbH (MM) businesses from defense contractor L3Harris Technologies Inc. for $400 million in cash.
Stuart Rogers Honored Among North America’s Top Counsel to M&A Advisors by MergerLinks
Stuart Rogers, partner in Alston & Bird’s Corporate & Business Transactions Group and co-head of the firm’s Financial Advisors Team, has been recognized by MergerLinks in its annual list of leading lawyers who have advised on the most valuable M&A deals in North America.
Robyn Downing Recognized with Inaugural “Haub Law Rising Star Award” by Pace University
Robyn Downing, associate in Alston & Bird’s Corporate & Business Transactions Group, has been honored by Pace University with its inaugural “Haub Law Rising Star Award” for her demonstrated passion and success in the practice of law.
Hilton Grand Vacations to Acquire Diamond Resorts International
Alston & Bird client Hilton Grand Vacations (HGV), has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Diamond Resorts International Inc. in a transaction valued at approximately $1.4 billion.
James Sullivan Named an Inaugural Fellow of the Herndon Directors Institute
James Sullivan, Alston & Bird partner and head of the firm’s New York office, has been selected as a Distinguished Fellow in the inaugural class of the Herndon Directors Institute (HDI), the nation’s first institute dedicated solely to preparing minorities and women as leaders in board governance.
Alston & Bird Ranked No. 6 Among Counsel to Investment Banks in 2020
Corporate Control Alert, the legal and financial dealmaking journal published by The Deal, has ranked Alston & Bird sixth among counsel to financial advisors on U.S. M&A transactions with a value of $100 million or more announced between Jan. 1 and Dec. 31, 2020.
Hormel Foods to Acquire Planters Nuts Business from Kraft Heinz for $3.35 Billion
Alston & Bird is acting as counsel to Citi and Credit Suisse in their roles as financial advisors to Hormel Foods in its announced $3.35 billion acquisition of the Planters snack nut portfolio from Kraft Heinz.
Alston & Bird Adds Corporate Oil & Gas Veteran Gaye Lentz in Fort Worth
Alston & Bird has bolstered its corporate offerings in the oil and gas industry with the addition of Gaye Lentz in the firm’s Fort Worth office.
BancorpSouth Bank to Acquire FNS Bancshares
Alston & Bird client BancorpSouth Bank has announced plans to acquire FNS Bancshares Inc., the parent company of FNB Bank, in a transaction valued at roughly $108.4 million.
Fifth Third Acquires Hammond Hanlon Camp
Alston & Bird client Fifth Third Bancorp has announced that its affiliate, Fifth Third Acquisition Holdings LLC, has acquired Hammond Hanlon Camp LLC (H2C), a premier strategic advisory and investment banking firm focused on the health care industry.
James Sullivan | The Art of the Multijurisdictional Transaction
James Sullivan, transactions partner, shares insights on structuring cross-border deals, an area with a decade of steady growth.