John Given is a Partner in the Firm’s Corporate Department specialising in M&A and high level corporate advisory work. John's practice is centred on providing pragmatic, strategic and innovative corporate advice to many leading Irish public and private companies, as well as multinational companies active in the Irish market, across a range of industry sectors.
Deals and Clients:
Deals on which John has advised include the following:
- IBM on its acquisition of Curam Software;
- Jazz Pharmaceuticals on its reverse takeover of Azur Pharma;
- Elan on the merger of Elan Drug Technologies with Alkermes Inc and subsequent IPO of Alkermes;
- Bank of Ireland in the sale of Bank of Ireland Asset Management (BIAM) to State Street Corporation and the sale of Bank of Ireland Securities Services (BOISS) to Northern Trust Corporation;
- Anglo American in the $308m sale of Lisheen Mine comprised in its $1.34bn sale of its zinc portfolio to Vedanta Resources;
- Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank, UBS, CitiGroup and Davy on Bank of Ireland's 2010 €3.4bn fully underwritten capital raising project and its 2011 €5.2bn capital raising project;
- Morgan Stanley in the $1.2bn public takeover of Skillsoft by Berkshire Partners;
- Elan Corporation, in its $2bn asset disposal programme and its subsequent US$855m equity investment by Johnson & Johnson and related €500m investment;
- GE Healthcare in the establishment of its CIS joint venture with Nycomed;
- Ryanair Holdings plc on its two public offers for Aer Lingus and its acquisition of a 29% stake in the airline;
- eircom on its acquisition of Meteor and its subsequent €2.4bn takeover by BCM Ireland Holdings and the eircom ESOT Trustee;
- RBS/Ulster Bank on the sale of NCB Group;
- The Irish Minister for Finance on the sale of ACC Bank;
- KPMG on its acquisition of the Irish Arthur Andersen practice.
Other clients for whom John frequently acts include U2 management company Principle Management, Allergan Inc, Real Estate Opportunities, Irish Continental Group, Bord Gáis Éireann, Ardmore Studios, various investment banks and financial advisers, and many other participants in the Irish and international market.
Roles:
John has served two terms on its Policy Committee, and is currently a member of its Management Committee.
Accolades and Testimonials:
John was awarded the accolade of 'Best M&A Lawyer' for Ireland by the European CEO Legal Awards for 2009.
Deals on which John has acted in a lead advisory capacity have received many accolades, including Finance Dublin magazine's prestigious "Deals of the Year" award 4 times in the past 6 years. Winning deals include Bank of Ireland's 2011 disposal of BIAM to State Street; Bank of Ireland's 2010 €3.4bn capital raising project; Elan Corporation, plc's 2009 $1.4bn equity and collaboration arrangements with Johnson & Johnson; and the 2007 acquisition of eircom by BCM Ireland Holdings Limited.
During John's tenure as Head of M&A, the Firm was consistently ranked in international league tables as the number 1 Irish M&A law firm, including:
- 8 years out of 8 - Thomson Reuters;
- 5 years out of 5 - Bloomberg, and
- 7 years out of 10 - mergermarket.
John is recommended by many leading international publications. Comments include: "The practical and responsive John Given..." (Legal 500); "…the excellent John Given." (Who's Who Legal - M&A); "John Given as usual attracts a lot of praise from clients and peers. He's more commercial, practical and sensible than many other lawyers." (IFLR1000); "Exceptionally capable and experienced....clever in his approach - he picks his battles wisely… punchy and to the point when it comes to doing business" (Chambers Global); "Versatile, practical and sensible John Given" (The Legal 500); "John is a real team player - he's very easy to get along with. He's highly responsive, and he's not a technocrat. He's one of the best in the market" (Chambers M&A Client Report).