White & Case has advised Play Communications S.A. (Play) and its shareholders, Novator and Olympia, on the EUR 1 billion initial public offering of Play on the Warsaw Stock Exchange, which values the company at EUR 4 billion (PLN 16 billion). Play will be listed on July 27, 2017. Latham & Watkins advised the banks on the IPO, which is reported to be Europe's largest IPO in the telecommunications sector since June 2015, and one of the five largest Polish IPOs ever.
Play, a portfolio company of private equity firms Novator and Olympia, was founded a decade ago and has increased its market share from less than five percent in 2008 to 27 percent in 2017, making it Poland’s second largest mobile network. It competes with Orange, Deutsche Telekom’s T-Mobile and Polkomtel’s Plus, and has more than 14 million customers.
“White & Case has a strong relationship with Novator and Olympia and we’ve been advising Play since 2014,” said White & Case Partner Ian Bagshaw, who co-led the firm’s deal team with Jill Concannon. “Our lawyers in London and Warsaw have advised on a complex and successful IPO that will allow the company to continue its exciting growth journey.”
In addition to Bagshaw and Concannon, the White & Case team included London-based Partners Jonathan Parry, Prabhu Narasimhan, Martin Forbes, and Nicholas Greenacre, Warsaw-based Partner Marcin Studniarek, Warsaw-based Local Partner Rafal Kaminski and Counsel Grzegorz Jukiel, London-based Associates Ben von Maur, James Greene, Benjamin Bierwirth, Brian Dearing, David Nisbet, and Nicola Chapman, and Warsaw-based Associate Monika Duzynska.
Editor's Note: After this article was published Weil, Gotshal & Manges – Pawel Rymarz sp.k. announced that, acting alongside global counsel Latham & Watkins, it had advised Global Coordinators and Joint Bookrunners J.P. Morgan Securities plc, Merrill Lynch International, and UBS Limited, as well as Bank Zachodni WBK S.A. and PKO Bank Polski S.A. Oddzial - Dom Maklerski PKO Banku Polskiego w Warszawie, acting as Joint Bookrunners and Co-Offering Agents, on matters of Polish law related to the initial public offering of Play Communications S.A..
Weil's Warsaw team included Partners Marcin Chylinski and Anna Frankowska, Counsel Ewa Bober, and Associate Krzysztof Jagiello.
