Mori Hamada, Ropes & Gray, Shearman get Bare for Shiseido
By Rashida Yosufzai
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Monday, 1 February 2010
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Shiseido – Bare Escentuals acquisition
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US$1.7bn
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Synopsis Cosmetics giant Shiseido acquires US make-up brand Bare Escentuals in two-step acquisition of shares
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Firm
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Client
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Role
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Mori Hamada & Matsumoto
Lead partners: Satoko Kuwabara; Kenji Ito
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Shiseido
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Japanese Counsel
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Shearman & Sterling
Lead partners: Peter Lyons, Ken Lebrun, John Cannon, Laurence Crouch
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Shiseido
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US Counsel
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Ropes & Gray
Lead partner: David Chapin
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Bare Escentuals
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US Counsel
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Mori Hamada & Matsumoto, Ropes and Gray and Shearman & Sterling have landed roles on one of the global cosmetics industry’s biggest transactions this year, the US$1.7bn acquisition of Bare Escentuals by Japan’s Shiseido. Bare Escentuals has a 67% share of the minerals make-up sector in the US.
The transaction will help push up Mori Hamada’s ranking in the 2010 M&A league tables – it lead both by deal value and volume in the 2009 Japan rankings, according to mergermarket.
A two-partner Mori Hamada team from the firm’s antitrust and M&A practices is working alongside eight lawyers from Shearman & Sterling, Shiseido’s US counsel. Shearman & Sterling has deployed lawyers across M&A, tax and compensation and benefits practices, from the firm’s New York and Tokyo offices. Ropes & Gray partner David Chapin is leading the charge advising BE.
For Mori Hamada and Shearman & Sterling, the transaction will be the first reported mandate they’ve received from the cosmetics giant, but Ropes & Gray’s Chapin is a longstanding counsel to BE’s largest shareholder, Berkshire Partners.
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