Transactions

Businesses worldwide call on our teams to deliver practical commercial advice. We bring a particular focus on legal innovation in the Technology, Energy & Infrastructure and Finance sectors.

Our goal is to serve as a business partner to our clients. To answer not only what can I do, but also what should I do? Our sector focus – on Technology, Energy & Infrastructure and Finance – helps us deliver insight into our clients’ businesses and market practices. As one client reported to Chambers 2017: "They have a very good commercial mindset, always understanding which battles are worth fighting."

We also help our clients innovate, including adapting deal structures to new products and markets worldwide. For the tech market, we joined up with Y Combinator to create a more flexible and efficient alternative to convertible note financings, and with Stripe to create Atlas, which makes it easier for international tech companies to incorporate in the U.S. We introduced the first use of P3 techniques to finance statewide high-speed internet infrastructure. We’re also immersed in China’s rapidly expanding tech market. In the energy markets, we completed a record-breaking financing for Japan’s largest solar plant, and we helped to develop the first floating LNG facility off the coast of Cameroon. Since the financial crisis, we have partnered with leading financial institutions to help reinvigorate the U.S. and European securitization markets. We introduced the first legal portal for the direct lending market, helped lead the creation of Italy’s mini-bond market, and completed the first prepack in France.

Our partnership is structured as one team, ensuring we can work seamlessly across 25 markets worldwide, including the United States, Europe and Asia. We serve the Latin American market from our Houston office. We excel in complex cross-border transactions, such as our representation of the board of Alstom SA, the French engineering giant, in the $13.5 billion sale of its energy division to GE, which IFLR selected as European M&A Deal of the Year in 2016. We worked with global triathlon leader Ironman in its acquisition of Lagardère Sports’ endurance division, which includes world-class races in eight countries across three continents. And we execute cross-border tech investments for clients such as Microsoft, AVG Technologies, Thales and Telenor.

We are focused on efficient execution – not only in the context of major transactions, but also in supporting your day-to-day operations. Through Orrick Analytics, we use proprietary technology and probability modeling to conduct large-scale contract reviews and other due diligence, reducing human error and resulting in high-quality outcomes and measurable savings. We help clients manage HR compliance globally through our Global Employment and Equity Compensation service. For our municipal clients, our subsidiary BLX manages debt offerings and investments from conception to redemption.

We know our clients measure success in many ways, from strategic execution to achieving financial close to the efficiency of our services. True success is often realized through long-term results. When our clients keep calling us for advice long after the transaction is completed, we know we are adding value.

Here are some highlights of our transactional work.

Tech

  • Earned The Recorder’s Corporate Department of the Year Award for Emerging Companies in 2016 for helping some of the most exciting entrepreneurs raise more than $6.6 billion last year in 300+ venture financings across 21 countries worldwide
  • Ranked Top 10 for Global M&A by MergerMarket, Thomson Reuters and Factset, and worked on the largest U.S. private company sales, such as Nest’s sale to Google, Cruise Automation’s sale to GM, and Instagram’s sale to Facebook.
  • Chambers-recognized lawyers for M&A and Private Equity in the U.S., UK, France, Germany, Italy, China, Japan and Latin America, and we executed more than 600 public and private company M&A transactions in markets worldwide, with a combined value of more than $100 billion, over the past five years.    

E&I

  • Rated in 24 Chambers energy and infrastructure categories in eight markets worldwide, including Band 1 ratings for U.S. PPP and Renewables & Alternative Energy in Chambers Global 2017
  • Worked on projects in 95 countries and all 50 U.S. states, winning us Law360 Project Finance Group of the Year for the fourth time
  • Act for participants in every major P3 transaction in the U.S. transport market
  • Assist in the development of the largest energy and infrastructure projects worldwide, such as LaGuardia Airport’s $4 billion New Terminal B Redevelopment Project – the first greenfield airport PPP project in the U.S. and the largest PPP project in North America to date

Finance

  • With more than 10 percent market share in 2016, we’ve been ranked by Thomson Reuters as the No. 1 bond counsel and disclosure counsel for 20 years in a row, and are among the top four underwriters’ counsel in the United States, a spot we've held for 10+ years
  • Rated top 6 issuer’s & underwriter’s counsel in U.S. ABS, MBS & CMBS by Asset-Backed Alert and Commercial Mortgage Alert in 2016, complemented by Chambers Band 1-rated Structured Practitioners in Italy and France
  • $10 billion in leveraged and specialty finance transactions in 2016
  • Consistently rank among the top 10 bankruptcy law firms according to The Deal
  • $30 billion in real estate transactions since 2015 on behalf of private equity funds and other institutional investors