Today, Axel Springer and US-American investor General Atlantic have entered into an agreement which relates to a future 30% participation of General Atlantic in the Online Classified Business of Axel Springer. For this purpose, both companies plan the establishment of a new company named Axel Springer Digital Classifieds GmbH with its registered seat in Germany. Axel Springer was advised by the international law firm Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy LLP regarding all corporate, tax and finance law aspects of the transaction.
The transaction is based on a company valuation of the participations to be contributed in the amount of EUR 1.25 billion. It is still subject to prior consultation with the relevant employee representatives in France, the exercise of an option right by Axel Springer and merger clearance by the competent competition authorities.
The Milbank team included partners Norbert Rieger, Martin Erhardt (both Corporate/M&A, Munich), Rolf Füger (Tax, Munich) and Thomas Ingenhoven (Finance, Frankfurt) and associates Ines Butenschön, Sebastian Heim, Katharina Kolb, Roman Stenzel (all Corporate/M&A, Munich), Tobias Beuchert, Florian Holzner, Matthias Schell (Tax, Munich), Astrid Drost, Oliver Hahnelt, Alexander Klein, Nikolas Koutsós and Maximilian Schneider (all Finance, 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 focuses its worldwide legal services in 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 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.
