King & Wood Mallesons (KWM) has advised amaysim Australia Limited (amaysim) on the sale of its mobile business to Optus Mobile Pty Limited (Optus).
On 2 November 2020, amaysim entered into a Share Sale Agreement (SSA) for the sale of amaysim's mobile business to Optus for cash consideration of $250 million. The mobile sale was the output of a strategic review undertaken by amaysim to consider options to maximise shareholder value.
The KWM team also assisted amaysim with its divestment of the Click Energy business, and its response to unsolicited expressions of interest in relation to the Mobile business that followed. amaysim proposes to delist and wind-up following completion which impacted the approach to the documents in both transactions.
The KWM team was led by M & A Partners Paul Schroder and David Eliakim, supported by Senior Associate Marc McCaughey and Solicitor Jing Wang. The project also involved a cross-practice group of lawyers including Competition Partner Caroline Coops, Employment Partner Andrew Gray, Tax Partner Leah Ranie, Insurance Special Counsel Mandy Tsang and M & A Senior Associate Fiona Tyas.
Commenting on the transactions M & A Partner David Eliakim said:
"We were very pleased to work with amaysim on these strategic transactions that had a core objective of maximising shareholder value."
Further commenting on the Optus deal M & A Partner Paul Schroder said:
"This was a strategic and challenging transaction. The team had to provide legal advice on various regulatory and operational issues and provide a clear pathway to distribute proceeds of the transaction to amaysim shareholders following the sale."
Earlier in the year KWM advised amaysim on an acquisition to grow amaysim's customer base by ~77,000 mobile subscribers acquired from My Mobile Data Pty Ltd (trading as OVO mobile) for $15.8 million.
The sale of amaysim's mobile business to Optus is conditional on shareholder approval. An Extraordinary General Meeting is expected to be held in January 2021, with completion shortly after.
