Ropes & Gray Represents Bain Capital in Gymboree Acquisition

Ropes & Gray advised Bain Capital in its $1.8 billion planned acquisition of Gymboree Corporation, announced on October 11. Attorneys involved were private equity partner R. Newcomb Stillwell (Boston) and associate Jason Freedman (San Francisco); corporate partner Julie Jones (Boston); and debt finance partners Byung W. Choi (Boston) and Michael Lee (Boston) and associate Patricia Lynch (Boston).

The firm's private equity lawyers have been involved in some of the most significant private equity deals of 2010, including representing a private equity consortium consisting of Berkshire Partners, Bain Capital and Advent International in the $1.1 billion leveraged buyout of SkillSoft; TPG in a co-investment with Goldman Sachs for the €1.2 billion secondary buyout acquisition of Ontex N.V.; and Thomas H. Lee Partners in its $1.1 billion acquisition of inVentiv Health.

In 2009, Ropes & Gray advised on three of the largest leveraged acquisitions of the year – on three continents: long-term client Bain Capital' s acquisition of Bellsystem24 in the largest buyout by a foreign private equity firm in Japan in nearly two years; the $5.2 billion acquisition by TPG Capital and the Canadian Pension Plan (CPP) Investment Board of IMS Health Inc., a leading provider of market intelligence to the pharmaceutical and healthcare industries; and Liberty Global Inc.'s 2.6 billion Euro high yield offering to finance the acquisition of Unity Media, a German-based provider of broadband Internet, telephone and digital TV.