Qelstra
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deals
Backbone to the business
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Assisted sale
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What'sNewS Issue 7 January/February 2001 I I
Booking one of its first major deals
since opening for business last Octo-
ber, Hong Kong's TMI hub will be one of
the co-arrangers of a USD 1.5 billion
financing facility for 1P
Backbone Co (IPBC) - a
50/50 joint venture be-
tween Pacific Century
CyberWorks Ltd
(PCCW) and Telstra Corp Ltd of Aus-
tralia. The new IPBC joint venture brings
together the international wholesale arms
of the Australian phone and Internet giant
and PCCW - one of Asia's largest inte-
grated Communications concerns- and will
be the second largest Internet Protocol
backbone company in the
Asia-Pacific region. Focusing on data and
Internet connectivity for the Asian whole
sale market, IPBC aims to tap into the
strong global demand for
bandwidth - largely Internet
driven - and will fill a gap
in bringing much needed
capacity to Asia's currently
under-served markets. The current deal
follows last April's co-arrangement of
bridge financing for PCCW's acquisition
of Cable Wireless HKT, and this facility
partially serves to repay that bridge loan.
'The deal will increase our visibility in the
Asian market as well as strengthen our re-
lationship with some of the key players in
the Asia-Pacific market,' says Marjon
Wind, head TMI Asia.
Originally intended as a USD 2 billion fa
cility slated at a lower interest rate, it was
scaled back and rate-adjusted to ensure an
investment grade credit rating. According
to lead arranger Barclays Bank, the inter
est boost reflectcd the global trend of in-
creased funding costs in the telecoms sec
tor and was not a deal-specific issue. Fully
undcrwritten by Barclays and Chase Man
hattan Bank, others giving commitments
include Citibank, HSBC, Credit Suisse
First Boston, Sanwa Bank and UBS War
burg.
Joining Marjon Wind in transacting the
deal were corporate banking's Berry Mart-
tin and Keivin Ho and credit analysts Wim
Borgmeier and Alice Yeung.
Get ready for RI's very own
News Site - the RI Meeting
Point. Set for launch 1 March, this
new medium offers management
news, new appointments, upcoming
events, F&A review, FAR Industry
Notes, Rabo-related press clippings
and interesting deals/transactions.
Not only will Meeting Point keep
you on top of the news, but it will
help you be more effective at your
job. Convenient and easy-to-use,
the site can be checked any time of
the day, keeping you tuned in to
what's news all the time. So keep
your eyes open for its launch - we'11
sec you at the Meeting Point.
For more information please con
tact Mirjam Diepenbrock, global
communication manager or Michel
Hofman of IT &C infrastructure.
Another success in MécA - this time,
it's our Paris team who have offered
invaluable advice and expertise to the
Groupe Bourbon in November 2000.
Groupe Bourbon, listed on the Paris Stock
Exchange, is a diversified group in retail,
shipping and agri-business with net sales
of Euro 1 billion. After Bourbon's deci-
sions to divest dairy relationships from its
portfolio, RI's expertise was called in to
provide assistance in the sale of Cilant,
Bourbon's dairy subsidiary, to Urcoopa
(Union de Coopératives Agricoles, based
on La Réunion island). The Compagnie
I.aitière de Mascareignes (Cilam) is a
leader in dairy products on La Réunion is
land. Cilam produces and distributes fresh
dairy products and milk (Yoplait and Can-
dia franchises), local cheeses (own
brands), fruit juices and drinks (Rea
Record heights in Paris: Jean-Fran<;ois Cruciani,
Josianne Lancelle and Marine Pauget
franchise) as well as ice creams (Pilpa
franchise). As of year-end December 1999,
Cilam achieved a Euro 76 million Consoli
dated net sales and cmploycd 500 people.
Sale advisors from the Paris M&A team
include Josiane Lancelle, Marine Pauget,
and Jean-Frangois Cruciani, with the in-
volvement of assistant Judith Ba Cham-
braud and trainee Robert Sinescu.
owncd subsidiary of Royal Philips Elec
tronics, the Netherlands - to give an off-
balance sheet treatment to the receivables
sold.
The team's challenge in structuring the fa
cility was to find a way to give Philips
Medical credit approval authority vis-a-vis
its clients in the all-important emerging
markets while simultaneously generating a
credit risk that would be acceptable to RI.
The solution lay in negotiating a tailor-
made insurance policy with Exporters In
surance Corporation that provides RI
with the credit enhancement it needed and
gives Philips Medical credit discretion in
its critical export markets. Together with
the USD 50 million ATI. financing, STF
now provides USD 100 million in export
financing capacity for Philips Medical Sys
tems worldwide making RI the single
largest export finance bank for Philips
Medical. As for STF's bottom line, the
Philips Medical and ATL facilities will
generate a combined annual income of
over USD 780,000.
Alongside STF NY key players Ling Tsou,
Stuart Barrowcliff, Peter Hall and
Zenaida Castro, the RI team for Philips
Medical included corporate banking Dal-
las's David Thomas and Todd Kemme,
STF Utrecht's Martin Sterkman and cor
porate banking Utrecht's Robin Bargmann
and Angela Paparo.
