"Birsel is a firm I respect. I was in the library the other day looking for a book and I found a book by Mr Birsel from 1975, I was four years old at that time," comments one partner....
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"Birsel is a firm I respect. I was in the library the other day looking for a book and I found a book by Mr Birsel from 1975, I was four years old at that time," comments one partner. It is a solid and respected firm that has an enviable pedigree in the Turkish market.
It is the banking, finance and projects teams that have arguably enjoyed the best year, with a deal list studded with sizeable mandates including a number of new financings.
One of these deals entailed a team, led by Begum Durukan Ozaydin, advising Ojer Telekomunikasyon on an OTAS secured financing deal. The $1.35 billion of financing was provided by Akbank, Citibank (London), Deutsche Bank (London), RBS and Turkiye Garanti Bankasi in March 2011.
The firm's projects work entailed a clutch of refinancing and restructuring of deals, including a $2.6 billion restructuring for ISKEN, the first coal-fired power plant constructed and run by the private sector. On this deal Birsel advised the senior lenders, which included Dresdner, KfW, West LB and ABSA as the existing security for the previous financing was renegotiated so that the sponsors could develop another new power plant.
On the corporate side, the team conducted due diligence into RTL's acquisition of a share in Dogan Yavin Holding and also acted for Dassault Systemes on the Turkish aspects of its acquisition of Project Life Cycle Management software distribution business of the computing giant IBM, both deals completing in late 2010.
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