We've been crowned the winner of the Finance Team of the Year at The Lawyer Awards 2020.
We were one of the lead advisers in respect of British Steel, one of the highest-profile corporate collapses in recent years.
The firm advised the UK arm of global investment adviser White Oak as senior secured lender and acted from May 2019, when British Steel went into liquidation, through to the sale on 9 March of British Steel businesses to the Chinese steel producer, Jingye.
Our Banking & Finance specialists (led by Banking & Finance partner Lerika Joubert and associate Katie Horbury) formed a team with our Restructuring & Insolvency specialists (led by partner and UK head of Restructuring & Insolvency Nick Moser and associate Luke Viner) to meet the unique and complex challenges involved in this international workout and debt restructuring.
This led to the British Steel business and thousands of jobs being preserved while White Oak was repaid in full.
The work consisted of a series of transactions. These included a significant syndicated facility agreement and FILO ("First In Last Out") facility, related to the company's high-profile liquidation proceedings.
Led by Nick Moser and Lerika Joubert, the team were praised particularly for their close collaboration across the practice teams and their technical innovation where there was no market precedent.
Nick Moser, partner and UK head of Restructuring & Insolvency commented: "This was a true team effort where there was a collaborative spirit throughout with White Oak and their US lawyers, Goldberg Kohn. We worked to cut through differences between stakeholders to find solutions to complex problems which otherwise could have resulted in litigation and the opportunity to achieve this great outcome would have been jeopardised.”
Lerika Joubert, Banking & Finance partner, added: "Working on a matter which is market-leading due to a lack of precedent in the UK market is a real gift for any multispecialist lawyer. This award shows the power of a cross-practice team, playing to our combined strengths as transactional finance lawyers and restructuring specialists. Neither part of the team could have achieved this without the other."
The ceremony took place virtually on 3 November 2020.
