Kyiv, 14 May 2007 – LAWFUEL – The Law Firm Newswire – Baker & McKenzie announced today that it recently acted as the legal advisor to Horizon Capital, fund manager of Emerging Europe Growth Fund, LP, a mid-cap private equity fund investing in Ukraine and Moldova, with respect to sale of its shares in the open joint stock company “Shostka City Milk Factory” (Shostka), one of the Ukraine’s cheese sector market leaders, to French Fromageries Bel (Bel Group).
The Kyiv office Corporate/Mergers & Acquisitions team was led by Mykola Stetsenko, associate, under general supervision of James Hitch, Managing Partner.
Shostka is a top five Ukrainian manufacturer of hard cheeses in terms of market share and owes its leading position and investment attractiveness to Horizon Capital, a private equity fund manager, which purchased the milk plant in 2005.
Commenting on this transaction, Oksana Strashna, Vice President of Horizon Capital, said: “When our company made a decision to exit its investment from Shostka, we could count on the law firm that knew this market and over years demonstrated its constancy and consistency. We were pleased to meet the majority of the same team whom we jointly worked with on Shostka acquisition in 2005 and entrusted legal advisory work on Shostka shares sale to them.”
Baker & McKenzie Managing Partner in Kyiv James Hitch commented: “We are proud that we were engaged to work on Shostka’s sale. This transaction again undoubtedly sustains our assertion on trusted advice we provide to our long-standing client in a sixth corporate transaction for a number of consecutive years.”
Bel Group was represented by DLA Piper Ukraine.
