FIRM BRIEFINGS INTERNATIONAL FIRMS Clifford Chance
2012 Firm Overview Active jurisdictions
Angola, Benin, Botswana, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Central African Republic, Chad, Cote d’Ivoire, DRC, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gabon, Ghana, Guinea, Kenya, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Mauritius, Mozambique, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Sierra Leone, South Africa, South Sudan, Tanzania, Togo, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe
Highlight clients Shell, KKR, IFC, Industrial & Commercial Bank of China, Wendel
Key offices Paris, London, Frankfurt, Amsterdam, Casablanca
Most active disciplines
International Arbitration, equity capital markets, M&A and joint- ventures, private equity and funds, asset finance, debt capital markets, project Finance (energy and infrastructure), renewables finance
Key sectors
Mining and metals, oil and gas, power, renewables and clean technology, ports
Law capability English, French, Portuguese, Spanish, US
Key partners Edmund Boyo, Jeremy Connick, Nikolaï Eatwell, Anthony Giustini, Kem Ihenacho, Audley Sheppard, Pieter van Welzen
Clifford Chance has had a committed Africa strategy for a number of years and can field a strong team across the disciplines, the continent and the energy and infrastructure sectors. It has a strong franchise with Asian and Indian clients and an active disputes practice. Recently, the firm has been very active in the South African renewables
programme , with partners including James Pay, David Metzger, Nicholas Wong and teams from London, Paris and Düsseldorf. The firm also worked on the single largest investment in Kenya’s history for the Lake Turkana Wind Farm. Clients praise Anthony Giustini and counsel Mar- ianne Pezant for their responsiveness and experience. “Giustini is amazing in terms of what he knows… he has been doing this for years [and] has a capacity to explain very complex things in very simple terms”, says a client, while another says he is “a solid partner when you need a good lawyer who can get things done beyond just the lawyering”. Clients praise the firm’s “accumulated experience in Africa” and say
“they are the best at protecting our interests”. Other key names include Pieter van Welzen, David Dunnigan, David Lewis, Edmund Boyo, Kem Ihenacho, Tim Lewis, David Steinberg, Gilles Lebreton and coun- sel Delphine Siino Courtin.
Matters Audley Sheppard was busy on litigation, dispute resolution and an ICC arbitration cases over oil production sharing agreements and a power plant project in Nigeria, while colleague Jeremy Kosky handled a sig- nificant mining sector arbitration cases related to facilities in the DRC. Anthony Giustini and Tim Lewis both led big corporate teams for
clients such as Dominium Petroleum, the African Finance Corporation and PAIDF. One of the firm’s big deals was for Royal Dutch Shell, which it advised on its $1.57 billion offer for Cove Energy; a deal with Kenyan and Tanzanian components. Kem Ihenacho also led a team as- sisting KKR on the acquisition of Acteon Group by US private equity energy group First Reserve. The deal spanned 30 African countries. Highlight finance deals saw Nikolaï Eatwell at the helm of a large
Paris-London team to advise the IFC, Proparco, BIO, DEG, EAIF, FMO and BOAD on a $350 million financing for phase three of the Azito Thermal Plant project in Cote d’Ivoire and Ranbir Hunjan advise State Bank of India on an $800 million financing of Bharat Petroleum’s exploration costs in Mozambique.
Clyde & Co
2012 Firm Overview Active jurisdictions
Angola, Burundi, Cameroon, Congo (Republic of), DRC, Ethiopia, Liberia, Mozambique, Nigeria, Somalia, Sudan, Tanzania, Zambia, Zimbabwe
Highlight clients
Sasol, Glencore, Econet Wireless, Kuwait Foreign Petroleum Exploration Company
Key offices London, Dar es Salaam, Dubai, Tripoli
Most active disciplines International arbitration, litigation, company and commercial, M&A and joint-ventures, banking, asset finance, project finance (energy, infrastructure and IPP), EPC
Key sectors
Mining and metals, oil and gas, power, renewables and clean technology, roads
Law capability English, French, Tanzanian
Key partners Peter Gray, Peter Kasanda, Philip Mace, John Morris, Michael Wachtel
Clyde & Co was the first international firm to have an office in Sub- Saharan Africa outside of South Africa. Outside its Tanzania base, led by Peter Kasanda, it has a “best friends” relationship with Scanlen & Holderness in Zimbabwe and operates through informal relationships elsewhere. The team is well known for oil and gas and exploration, power and maritime, with strong experience in tax cases, in West Africa, and in infrastructure. One client praises oil and gas partner Mike Wachtel for his “under-
standing of the financing requirements of junior oil and gas companies and the international oil and gas sector”. “He helped us to complete our fundraising in record time”, adds the client. Clients also recom- mend dispute lawyers Anthony Albertini and David Owens for being “very diligent” and Peter Gray for “compliance matters… construction contracts, maritime law and joint-ventures”. “Peter has a lot of experi- ence in Africa and brings a lot to the table when we work in East Africa”. The firm has worked in 46 countries across the region and in 2012,
as well as launching an office in Libya, has begun to provide clients with Africa focused alerts and publications.
Matters In 2012 David Bennet and Mark Walsh have been engaged in arbitra- tion over an oil rig in Cameroon, while Anthony Albertini, Tim Taylor and Leigh Williams all acted in an insurance dispute relating to an FPSO installation in West Africa and road infrastructure arbitration on the Horn of Africa. The firm represented private and public entities in the cases. Among the corporate highlights Philip Mace worked on a multi-bil-
lion joint-venture in Nigeria’s oil and gas sector while also in Nigeria Peter Gray and George Booth represented a client on a power sector acquisition. A notable mining deal saw Philip Rogers advising a client on an acquisition in the DRC. Gray and Peter Kasanda assisted in financings, working with Econet
Wireless Global on $362 million from an Afrexim-led syndicate for the expansion of its facilities in Zimbabwe and Burundi. Chris Duffy has also been working with Anglo African Capital on speculative iron ore investments in Liberia, Zimbabwe and Sudan.
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