IFLR 1000
The Guide to the World's Leading Financial Law Firms

Sidley Austin scores highly on client relations, commerciality and efficiency. According to one client, "they took it [all] in their stride and made themselves available at all times", while another says: "It has been a natural fit, when we want a firm in the UK we contact them. They also help us to connect with other firms globally."

The firm's international ability is vital for some: "it was important that communications were fluid between offices as the transaction moved so quickly and bad communications would have ruined the deal".

Key to the feedback are partners David Went and Stephen Kinsella: "They were as innovative as my risk tolerance would allow ... Their knowledge of the law was fantastic and business acumen top notch," says one client. The duo is also accredited with "applying solutions in a persuasive way" and being "creative in problem solving". "If they were to move to another firm," says the client, "I would be hard pressed not to follow as they do such a great job."

In highlight mandates, the firm won multi-jurisdictional clearance (including in Europe) for Aon's $4.9 billion acquisition of Hewitt Associates. Before the EU Commission the firm also acted for LG Electronics for merger control clearance on its joint-venture with Ericsson. Complicating the deal, the joint-venture also needed clearance in Brazil, Korea and Russia.

The firm has a diverse competition practice spanning competition authorities across Europe and the world. For Corn Products International the firm filed merger notices (for its acquisition of National Starch) in the US, Brazil and Mexico, it handled competition matters in Germany, Norway and Turkey for FLIR Systems in its acquisition of Raymarine, and for Cephalon across a number of European countries.

"Excellent, we had some real professionals on this deal," says a client of Sidley Austin's team. "Jens [Rinze] was very tactful with expressing his solutions for projects. He is very experienced in very difficult situations. There was no recollection of any problems," says another.

The aforementioned Rinze has been active for WestLB in respect of amending a number of existing trade receivables transactions and on a new pan-European trade receivables transaction under the Compass ABSproM Programme, as well as the establishment of a pan-European trade receivables Factoring Programme.

A rare deal, which closed in March 2011, saw him active for DBRS in respect of the rating of a €1.1 billion true sale CLO of a German credit institution.

A major German investment bank also required Rinze's assistance on the implementation of the new capital rules in respect of securitisation transactions under Dodd Frank and the European Capital Requirements Directive. This strategic advice implemented the new securitisation capital regimes of the US, Germany and the European Union into the policy books of a major German investment bank.

An ongoing deal also saw partner Jérôme Friedrich advising a major German bank in connection with the restructuring of various synthetic CMBS structures.

The derivatives team at Sidley Austin is led by Elizabeth Uwaifo and last year she acted for KBC Financial Products in the restructuring of collateral arrangements in several CDO transactions. Paul Matthews was also called in by KBC Financial Products to advise on the new generation of synthetic CDO products and their synchronisation with older product types. Matthews also acted for Swiss Re on the issuance of insurance linked securitisation catastrophe bonds valued at €275 million by Calypso Capital.

The last year has been fairly tumultuous for the Sidley Austin structured finance and securitisation team with three partners Dennis Dillon (Hogan Lovells), Rob Torch and Jonathan Edge leaving the firm and another, Michael Durrer, moving to the firm's New York office. In response, John McGrath was made up to partner with Bryce Peterson being promoted to counsel. This upheaval was noted by peers: "Sidley definitely exited the market," says one practitioner and another agrees: "Sidley have lost a significant number of their practitioners."

Despite this the firm was still mandated on some notable transactions including advice to Whitehall, RREEF, Capita and Deutsche Trustee over a €3.5 billion debt restructuring including €1.13 billion in CMBS notes.

Another highlight saw a team led by Partha Pal and Mike Durrer acting for the joint lead managers including Standard Chartered and BNP Paribas and the issuer Korea Housing Finance Corporation (KHFC) on the issue of $500 million in covered bonds.

Another deal which saw the team acting for the banks saw the firm advising Banc of America Securities, Deutsche Bank and its securities arm, Merrill Lynch and UBS as the lead managers on three separate issuances under the Nationwide RMBS Silverstone programme.

Thomas Thesing leads the Sidley M&A team in London. The firm is better know for its capital markets work in London, but the team does crop on select transactions.

An example of this is the team's work advising FLIR Systems on the $180 million acquisition of Raymarine. The deal went through many permutations and indeed the takeover's structure was changed many times eventually resulting in a pre-pack purchase of the company from administration. This was the first time a LSE listed company had been bought through a pre-pack while being the subject of a hostile takeover.

Thesing led on the previous deal as he also did when the firm acted for AllscriptsMiSys Healthcare Solutions on its merger with the Eclipsys corporation. The deal saw Allscripts parent company MiSys reducing its shareholding to a minority stake.

One client who worked with Thesing said: "I have good contacts with the partner, this relationship is very important. The partner is needed to oversee to the core deal, he knows what we want. We have a lot of interactions in other areas not necessarily on M&A."

Department head Patrick Corr took on some of Sidley's major restructuring mandates last year including advise to the Regus Group on the restructuring of its UK operations. Corr also acted for the joint administrators of Titan Outdoor Advertising as part of the restructuring of the Titan Outdoor Group.

He is certainly held in high regard by clients: "Technically astute, good level of technical knowledge, commercial approach, excellent negotiator," says one. "Patrick is one of the best in the industry, he has received a personal accolade from the head of restructuring at Bank of America Merrill Lynch for these abilities."

Clients were also keen to point out that though the firm is not cheap, the benefits of the advice received balanced this out: "He [Corr] saved us a lot of money on deals. Not cheap but good value for money," says one.

The team also acted for the Smurfit Stone Container Group on its Canadian bankruptcy proceedings.