Restructuring & Insolvency

De Brauw Blackstone Westbroek advises on the successful restructuring of HEMA's capital structure. De Brauw advised HEMA on the implementation of a complex and multi-jurisdictional debt restructuring and recapitalisation process. This process was successfully completed on 19 October 2020. As a result, HEMA's existing bond debt of €750 million was more than halved to €300 million and its liquidity position greatly improved with an additional bond financing of €42 million. With a solid balance sheet and a profitable operation, HEMA can now fully concentrate on its future. De Brauw and HEMA have been working on the restructuring of HEMA's capital structure since 2019. On 15 June 2020, after extensive negotiations, HEMA reached an agreement with its banks and a group of noteholders holding approximately 62% of the €600 million senior secured notes and more than 50% of the €150 million senior notes, to reduce its debt in a controlled manner to safeguard the future of the company. The restructuring was implemented through court proceedings in three jurisdictions: a scheme of arrangement in England, a Chapter 15 proceeding in the United States and security enforcement proceedings in the Netherlands. The recapitalisation was achieved through a number of debt-for-equity swaps. The existing debt structure, including NY law and UK law governed publicly traded notes and bank financing, added particular complexity to the transaction. The transaction required a multi-expertise and cross-jurisdictional approach. De Brauw worked with counsel in the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, the United States, Belgium and Luxembourg. Involved practice groups included finance & restructuring, corporate advisory, capital markets, competition, employment and employment benefits, tax, M&A and financial regulatory. As lead counsel, De Brauw worked as part of an integrated team with Slaughter and May and Cravath, Swaine & Moore. Goldman Sachs International acted as financial adviser. The De Brauw team was led by restructuring partner Ferdinand Hengst.Finance & Restructuring: Ferdinand Hengst, Reinout Vriesendorp, Niek Biegman, Tristan Peters, Laurens Peters, Sebastian Hinse, Gilles Becker, Thijs Elseman, Roos de Blécourt, Chris Noordam, Kirsten Lagerweij, Laurens van de Ven and Hafida FaroukTax: Wiebe Dijkstra, Joppe de Bruijn, Pim Siemons, Dana Horvath and Maarten van der WeijdenLitigation: Reinout Vriesendorp, Berto Winters, Charissa Veldman, Hylke ten Bruggencate, Mick Gerrits, Dennis de Feij, Geert Lokhorst, Malte Malycha, Rein Ferwerda and Jeroen van der SchrieckCorporate advisory: Mark Rebergen, René van Tricht, Peter Nolten, Daan Gieben and Tijmen van de Leemkolk Employment: Janneke van der Kroon, Barbara Kloppert and Rik van Haeringen M&A: Arne Grimme, Heather Giannandrea, Chaggai Kon and Sasja Uijldert FMR: Mariken van Loopik and Tjalling Waterbolk Competition and state aid: Maikel van Wissen

De Brauw Blackstone Westbroek, working as a combined team with Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP and Slaughter and May, is advising Just Eat Takeaway.com on its announced USD 7.3 billion all-stock acquisition of Grubhub Inc., which would create the world’s largest online food delivery company outside of China. The combined group will be built around four of the world’s largest profit pools in online food delivery: the US, the UK, the Netherlands and Germany, increasing the Combined Group’s ability to deploy capital and resources to strengthen its competitive positions in all its markets. Just Eat Takeaway.com is listed on Euronext Amsterdam and the Main Market of the London Stock Exchange and will introduce an ADR listing in the US. As adviser to Just Eat Takeaway.com, the intricacies of this transaction required a multi-expertise approach whereby experts from various practices including M&A, corporate advisory, capital markets, competition law, employment and employment benefits, tax and financial regulatory were involved. Team effort by: Klaas de Vries, Reinier Kleipool, Tijmen Klein Bronsvoort, Gert Slatman, Max Lamb, Gaby Smeenk, Jan Willem Hoevers, Vivian Lee, Josse Klijnsma, Helen Gornall, Evija Butane, Barbara Kloppert, Daniël van Gerven, Henk van Ravenhorst, Vera Gal, Mariken van Loopik, Maurits ter Haar and Bas Boutellier

Despite the coronavirus outbreak and a 30% fall in oil prices, resulting in heavy losses on stock markets around the world, Digital Realty has completed its USD 8.4 billion exchange offer for Netherlands-based InterXion Holding N.V. De Brauw advised Digital Realty alongside Latham & Watkins. As an NYSE-listed US Real Estate Investment Trust, Digital Realty is subject to specific tax restrictions. Dutch company InterXion is also listed on the NYSE, and it has 50 data centres in 11 European countries. This transaction posed intertwining, complex legal and tax issues that had to be carefully navigated. Our firm’s extensive experience in this type of transaction and our cross-expertise teamwork were instrumental in achieving a successful completion. Read more about this deal here. De Brauw team: Paul Cronheim, Wiebe Dijkstra, Tijmen Klein Bronsvoort, Myrthe van der Klei, Klaas Versteeg, Willem Bijveld, Rozemarijn Vernooij, Joppe de Bruijn, Casper Nagtegaal, Sanne Veenstra, Bojana Prlja, Pim Siemons, Sophia van Straalen, Stephanie The, Fatima el Ghamarti, Barbara Kloppert, Daniel van Gerven, Tim Bird, Etienne Dijkhorst, Alisha Autar, Thijs Elseman, Anna Sablicova, Koen Orbons, Laura Elize de Vries and Bart de Rijke.

In previous articles, we looked at several key aspects of the Dutch restructuring scheme (known as the "WHOA"), including: how the scheme operates; the ban on appealing lower court decisions; combining WHOA and US plans; and how the scheme works in practice. In other jurisdictions, insolvency proceedings similar to the WHOA are increasingly used to settle mass damages claims. A recent noteworthy example concerns Purdue Pharma, which initiated Chapter 11 proceedings to restructure its debts, consisting for a large part of mass damages claims arising from its role in the opioid crises. The WHOA may also have this potential to be used as an instrument to settle mass damages claims.

On 13 February 2024, the Amsterdam Court of Appeal ruled that the statutory ban on filing appeals against decisions by courts of first instance in Dutch WHOA proceedings meets the requirements set out in the EU Insolvency Regulation. According to the Court of Appeal, this regulation does not give parties a stand-alone right to have their case re-evaluated by a second fact-finding court. Parties looking to have a first-instance WHOA decision overturned may only do so under specific circumstances allowing them to override the statutory appeal ban.

On 11 August 2023, Diebold Nixdorf, the cash machine manufacturer operating worldwide, successfully completed an extensive debt restructuring by combining and carrying out Chapter 11 proceedings in the US, and WHOA proceedings in the Netherlands. De Brauw partner Ferdinand Hengst took a key role as court-appointed observer in the WHOA portion, which was recognised under Chapter 15 in the US for the first time ever.