MUNICH, 18 August 2011 – On 29 July 2011, the €1.225 billion sale of ProSiebenSat.1's business activities in Belgium and the Netherlands closed. Advised by the international law firm Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy LLP on corporate, tax, finance and antitrust law, the ProSiebenSat.1 Group signed agreements to sell its TV and print activities in the Netherlands and its TV business in Belgium on 20 April 2011. The disposal of the Belgian activities closed on 8 June 2011. The sale of the activities in the Netherlands was subject to merger control clearance, but on 22 July 2011, the Netherlands Competition Authority (NMa) granted approval for this transaction. The businesses were acquired by a consortium of Sanoma Corporation and Talpa Holding NV regarding the Netherlands and of Sanoma Corporation, Corelio N.V. and Waterman & Waterman CVA in Belgium.
The ProSiebenSat.1 group was advised on the transaction by Milbank partners Martin Erhardt (lead), Christoph Rothenfusser (all corporate law/M&A, Munich), Thomas Kleinheisterkamp (lead, tax law, Munich), Alexander Rinne (antitrust/regulatory law, Munich), Thomas Ingenhoven (finance law, Frankfurt) and associates Michael Pujol, Sebastian Olk, Roman Stenzel (all corporate law/M&A, Munich), Florian Holzner (tax law, Munich) and Astrid Drost (finance law, Frankfurt).
About Milbank
Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy LLP is a leading international law firm founded in 1866 in New York City. Today Milbank has offices in Beijing, Frankfurt, Hong Kong, London, Los Angeles, Munich, New York, São Paulo, Singapore, Tokyo and Washington DC and is present in all major financial and economic centers of the world. Milbank’s main focus regarding its worldwide legal services are the areas of finance, transactions and litigation.
The first European office was opened in 1979 in London, followed by Frankfurt in 2001 and Munich in 2004. Due to the close cooperation of the German offices with the finance, corporate, cartel, and tax lawyers practicing in the other Milbank offices, in particular London and New York, Milbank Germany is in a position to provide fully integrated legal advice on the highest level in all these core areas pursuant to German, English and US law.