International Financial Law Review (IFLR) recently revealed its shortlist of deals and firms of the year for its 2019 Asia Pacific Awards. Morrison & Foerster is proud to be on the list as one of the candidates for Private Equity Firm of the Year.

The IFLR Asia Awards recognize some of the top-performing practice groups and firms, as well as the most significant deals in the region over the past year. This nomination is a strong testament to MoFo Asia’s private equity team and their outstanding track record.

“We’re honored to be shortlisted as a candidate for Private Equity Firm of The Year by IFLR Asia in its 2019 awards,” said Marcia Ellis, co-head of Morrison & Foerster’s Asia private equity practice and a member of the firm’s global board of directors. “Recognitions like this highlight the strength our diverse partners and top associates bring to the Asia market and the breadth of industries they cover, from technology and consumer products to energy, manufacturing, and transportation.”

In addition to the firm nomination, two of MoFo’s private equity deals have been shortlisted for private equity deal of the year. They are:

• Bain Capital-led consortium/Toshiba Memory Corporation
• Nesta Investment/ Global Logistic Properties

“The success of Morrison & Foerster’s private equity team has a lot to do with our growing complementary practices — such as fund formation, tax, finance, capital markets, and public M&A — that meet our clients’ specific needs when it comes to advising on complex deals in Asia and an outstanding litigation team supporting us.” said Thomas Chou, co-head of the firm’s Asia Private Equity practice. “2018 was a tremendous year for our team and we look forward to continuing to build on that momentum this year.”

In addition to the shortlisted deals, the team also successfully completed or announced many headline matters for our clients, including:

• Alibaba Group in relation to Ant Financial’s US$14 billion Series C fundraising, valuing Ant Financial at approximately US$150 billion
• SoftBank in connection with further $4.6 billion purchase of Didi shares
• SoftBank in connection with investments by Softbank Group Corp. and the SoftBank Vision Fund totaling $4.4 billion into WeWork
• SoftBank in connection with an investment as part of a US$3 billion investment by SoftBank and the SoftBank Vision Fund into Ele.me, the food delivery business owned by Alibaba
• Softbank Vision Fund in its investment into Grab, Southeast Asia’s biggest ride-hailing firm, its investment into the firm totaling US$1.5 billion
• Ally Bridge Group in its equity investment in GRAIL, a company developing a blood test to detect cancer early, before symptoms appear, in order to offer higher survival rates compared to late-stage diagnosis. The investment, led by our client, raised US$300 million in an oversubscribed Series C financing
• Oriente, a Hong Kong-based financial services and technology company, in its US$105 million initial funding round, and a series of recent expansions in Southeast Asia, including two strategic alliances - Cashalo in the Philippines with JG Summit, and Finmas in Indonesia with Sinar Mas
• The independent committee of Alibaba Group Holding Limited in Alibaba’s acquisition of a 33% equity interest in Ant Financial, China’s leading financial services company
• SoftBank as lead investor in the follow-on funding by existing investors in India’s online grocery startup Grofers International
• SoftBank, in its investment into Oravel Stays, India’s largest hospitality company and hotels aggregator behind OYO Rooms
• Walmart, in a $500 million financing and strategic alliance with New Dada, China's largest localized on-demand logistics and grocery O2O ecommerce platform. The transaction included a $320 million investment by Walmart and a new business cooperation agreement

For further details on the IFLR Asia Awards, click here.

Winners will be announced at a ceremony in Hong Kong on March 7, 2019.