Ropes & Gray’s Stillwell Named The American Lawyer’s “Dealmaker of the Week”

The American Lawyer has named Ropes & Gray private equity transactions partner R. Newcomb Stillwell “Dealmaker of the Week” for his role in Blackstone’s recent $3 billion planned purchase of Emdeon Inc., a medical-billing services company.

Blackstone, a leading global investment and advisory firm, is acquiring the Nashville, Tenn.-based Emdeon in a deal announced Aug. 4. Emdeon—which went public in 2009—will become a private company following regulatory and stockholder approval. The deal is expected to close in the second half of 2011.

Stillwell led a team of Ropes & Gray attorneys who worked on the deal. He told The American Lawyer that Blackstone contacted the firm just weeks before the deal was signed, and his team quickly began preparing merger documents and starting the due diligence process.

“A big part of the diligence project was really understanding the health care regulatory and IP aspects of the business,” Stillwell told The American Lawyer. “And we have a lot of really sharp people [who] know that stuff frontwards and backwards.”

Stillwell is the third Ropes & Gray partner named “Dealmaker of the Week” by The American Lawyer in the last 12 months.

In September 2010, Ropes & Gray corporate partner Jane Goldstein, head of the firm’s retail & consumer brands group, was recognized for her role in representing Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, Inc. in its acquisition of Canadian gourmet coffee roaster Van Houtte from its private equity owner Littlejohn for CDN $915 million in cash.

 

And in November 2010, Julie Jones, co-leader of Ropes & Gray’s securities & public companies practice, was recognized for representing TPG Capital in its $3 billion acquisition, with Leonard Green & Partners, of clothing retailer J.Crew.