Three BigLaw firms advise in the deal creating a top ten US cable company which involves TPG Capital and Google Capital.
The law firms Kirkland & Ellis LLP, Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP and Locke Lord LLP are advising on TPG Capital’s acquisition of RCN Telecom Services, LLC (RCN) for US$1.6 billion and Grande Communications Networks LLC (Grande) for $650 million from ABRY Partners.
According to The Wall Street Journal, Alphabet Inc.’s growth-equity investment fund Google Capital is taking a minority stake in the companies. Google Capital specialises in later-stage companies while Google Ventures is Alphabet’s start-up investment fund.
The deal between the two private equity firms TPG and ABRY will create a top ten US cable company with significant regional broadband assets providing high-speed data to residential and business customers in areas in America’s east and west coasts.
Grande has operations in the Texas cities of Austin, Dallas and San Antonio while RCN serves Boston, Chicago, Lehigh Valley, New York, Pennsylvania and Washington, DC.
The Kirkland team was led by corporate partners Armand Della Monica and Constantine Skarvelis with associates Mike Miller, Daniel Tavakoli, Ananda Mehta and Micah Kantrowitz.
Capital markets partners Josh Korff and Brian Hecht, debt finance partner Ashley Gregory, tax partner Vincent Thorn and associate Vivek Ratnam, executive compensation partner Michael Krasnovsky and associate Ian Sherwin, employee benefits partner Alexandra Mihalas and associate Scott Metzger, labour partner Matthew Keiser and associate Michael Schulman, technology/IP transactions partner Edward Sadtler and associate Daisy Darvall, environmental partner Jonathan Kidwell and real estate partner Jennifer Sheehan also worked on the deal.
According to TPG, it is partnering with Patriot Media, the management team headed by Steve Simmons and Jim Holanda which has managed RCN and Grande since 2010 and 2013, respectively.
