Clifford Chance (CC), Covington & Burling and Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom are advising on the £930m flotation of over two thirds of vehicle breakdown group the AA to City investors.
CC, led by M&A partner David Pearson is advising the AA on the accelerated stock market listing. Covington and Burling’s corporate partner Paul Claydon is advising Cenkos Securities as sole co-ordinator and bookrunner.
The Covington team also includes partners Simon Amies, Natalie Walter, Kristian Wiggert and Charlotte Hill.
Daniel Tricot, of Wall Street’s Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher and Flom, is acting for Greenhill, financial advisor to the transaction.
Speaking to Legal Business, Clayton said: ‘Cenkos are a regular client and we have [also] worked together on a few IPO’s in the last twelve months. The last one involved the flotation of Rightster Group. We acted for Rightster Group and Cenkos acted as the broker, separately represented.’
The AA announced its intention to proceed with a sale and flotation on 6 June, with 69% of shares sold to a management buy-in team led by executive chairman Bob Mackenzie and backed by leading institutional cornerstone investors, including Aviva, Blackrock, Invesco and CRMC. A share price of £930 million has already been agreed, with the admission total expected to reach £1.4bn in the second half of June.
In a statement Mackenzie said: ‘The AA is a very successful organisation with a strong record of serving its members and the needs of the UK motorist. We believe there are significant opportunities to grow the business, a sentiment shared by the high quality leading cornerstone investing institutions who have already committed over £930 million to the transaction.’
Kathryn.mccann@legalease.co.uk
