Baker Botts, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and Weil Gotshal & Manges have won top roles on the $8bn (£6bn) sale of Formula One.
Freshfields partners Charles Hayes and Valerie Ford Jacob advised the sellers CVC Capital Partners, which owns Formula One’s parent company Delta Topco.
US bank Lehman Brothers also held a stake in the motorsports business and turned to Weil Gotshal & Manges partner Peter King for support.
Under the terms of the deal, US media giant Liberty Global will buy Formula One for $8bn by acquiring 100 per cent of the shares of Delta Topco.
The acquisitive Liberty Global sought counsel from longstanding adviser Baker Botts, who fielded a team led out of the US.
Several members of Formula One’s senior management team also received advice from Macfarlanes, with a team including M&A head Ian Martin, corporate partner Stephen Drewitt and tax partner Peter Abbott.
The motorsports business will be renamed the Formula One Group as a result of the acquisition, with Bernie Ecclestone remaining as its CEO. The group will continue to be based in London.
Background to the deal
Freshfields is a regular adviser to private equity group CVC Capital Partners. The magic circle firm worked on its 2012 sale of $1.6bn (£1.2bn) Formula One shares to three investors ahead of the company’s planned IPO.
At the time, partner Chris Bown looked after the magic circle firm’s relationship with CVC, although he left a year later for an in-house role at the group. The relationship is now handled by partner Hayes, who worked with Bown as an associate on the deal, as well as CVC’s purchase of Sky’s betting business in 2014.
Weil Gotshal is meanwhile a regular adviser to Lehman Brothers, raking in $383m (£244m) in 2012 after the collapse of the bank.
Liberty Global has been on acquisition spree in the last few years and has called upon a variety of firms for advice. Baker Botts worked with the media company on its recent litigation settlement with Vivendi, which stemmed from a transaction between the companies in 2001.
Other firms to win work from Liberty include Shearman & Sterling and Ropes & Gray on its purchase of Cable & Wireless, and Freshfields on its Dutch merger with Vodafone’s mobile business.
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