LONDON, Nov. 18 2004 – LAWFUEL – Law, legal, law firm news – Despite continuing political unrest in the Middle East, Israeli companies are playing an increasingly larger role on the world stage, says a lawyer from White & Case who has been actively involved in Israeli-related transactions.
“Israel has more companies listed on NASDAQ than any country outside
North America. Israel is a large sophisticated market as represented by the
growing number of Israeli-related deals White & Case has handled in the past
year,” said Joshua Kiernan, head of White & Case’s Israel practice.
Kiernan points to two capital market transactions on which White & Case
advised that closed in the past week as examples of this emerging trend. The
Firm advised Lehman Brothers, as sole book-running manager in the $108 million
initial public offering of common stock and New York Stock Exchange listing of
Ormat Technologies, Inc, which designs, develops, builds, owns and operates
clean, environmentally friendly geothermal power plants and recovered energy-
based plants. Ormat is a subsidiary of Ormat Industries, Ltd., an
international power systems company that is listed on the Tel Aviv Stock
Exchange.
White & Case also represented Merrill Lynch and Lehman Brothers in a
$125 million convertible bond offering by an Israeli technology company listed
on NASDAQ and the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange.
Kiernan adds that the Israeli market is not only increasingly
sophisticated but also that the companies involved often operate at the
cutting edge.
“The technology coming out of Israel is some of the most exciting in the
world. For example, one of our clients, Given Imaging, just won recognition
from The Wall Street Journal as the Biotech-Medical winner and overall winner
of the Silver Medal for technology innovation in 2004 for its video camera
contained in a swallowable, pill-shaped capsule. This makes it an exceedingly
exciting market,” said Kiernan.
Earlier this year, White & Case represented Given Imaging on its
$90 million SEC-registered secondary offering.
Other Israeli-related deals on which the Firm advised include representing
Merrill Lynch on a $150 million convertible bond offering by Makhteshim-Agan,
the world’s largest manufacturer of generic crop protection products;
Citigroup on the SEC-registered IPO and NASDAQ listing of semiconductor
company PowerDsine; and Frutarom, a specialty chemicals company, in its
acquisition of the European food preparation business of IFF. In addition, the
Firm has a number of ongoing Israeli capital markets transactions.
White & Case has a leading Israel practice based in London, New York and
Palo Alto serving clients across a broad rang of practice areas, including
capital markets, M&A, projects finance, intellectual property and tax.
Drawing on the Firm’s worldwide network, White & Case is ideally suited to
assist Israeli companies as they become increasingly global.
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