Ilyashev & Partners has advised Latvia's Lu Invest on its sale of a 49.99% participatory interest in Ukrainian agri-holding Golden Sunrise Agro to Cyprus's Unagro Finance Limited, which already owned the other 50.01% of the company. The Latvian office of PWC Legal reportedly worked on the deal as well.
Golden Sunrise Agro was established in 2006. According to Ilyashev & Partners, the holding company has founded the Latagroinvest, Orilkalarinvest, Ukrlatagro, Agrolatinvest, and Agrotop companies, among others, as well as the Vlasivskiy Miroshnyk and Sorochanskiy Miroshnyk elevators. The company's land bank covers approximately 32,000 hectares, and its elevators have a combined capacity of around 160,000 tons.
According to Ilyashev & Partners, the deal "was executed in Ukraine and subordinated to laws of the State of New York, [in] the USA, whereby Latvian Swedbank was engaged as an escrow agent for settlement purposes. The project was implemented in collaboration with PwC Legal Latvia.
Ilyashev & Partners's team was led by Partner Yevgen Solovyov.
Editor's Note: After this article was published, PWC Legal confirmed that it was lead legal advisor of LU Invest on the deal. The firm's core team consisted of Managing Partner Janis Lagzdins, Partner Benno Butulis, and Co-Head of M&A Janis Gavars.