Bernardo L. Piereck

Bernardo L. Piereck represents private equity, private company and public company clients on mergers, acquisitions and divestitures, and general corporate and securities matters. His experience includes cross-border mergers and acquisitions involving both strategic and financial buyers, sellers and financial sponsors in inbound and outbound transactions, complex consortium investments and take-privates. He has experience leading complex transaction spanning various industry sectors including technology, industrial, healthcare, consumer services, financial services and business services. Mr. Piereck has worked on some of the market’s most significant transactions in recent years, including the largest private equity-backed acquisition since the 2008 financial crisis, according to Bloomberg.

Mr. Piereck is also a member of the firm’s emerging markets practice, with a focus on Latin America. He has represented numerous international private equity sponsors and larger corporate clients in acquisitions throughout the region. He also has extensive expertise advising Latin American companies seeking to establish or expand their global footprint across the United States and abroad, and has worked on numerous complex multi-national transactions, including his representation of GMéxico Transportes S.A. de C.V. in its US$2.1 billion acquisition of the Florida East Coast Railway.

Mr. Piereck has been listed as a recommended lawyer for Corporate/M&A and Capital Markets by The Legal 500 Latin America. He is also listed as a ‘Mexico Specialist’ in The Legal 500’s Private Practice Powerlist. In addition, Mr. Piereck is named as a “notable practitioner” for M&A and private equity by IFLR 1000.

Prior to joining Dechert, Mr. Piereck worked in the Washington, D.C. office of an international law firm where he represented clients in the negotiation and drafting of core and ancillary transaction documentation in relation to the acquisition and divestiture of several public and private target companies.

Prior to entering private practice, Mr. Piereck worked as a lead economist at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Washington, D.C., where he led audits and investigations into market power abuses.

Estancia Capital Partners and its portfolio company R&T Deposit Solutions on a recapitalization which includes a significant investment from GTCR, a leading private equity firm.
Energy Harbor Corp. in its proposed acquisition by Vistra Corp.
GIC, as part of an investor consortium led by Permira and Hellman & Friedman, in its US$10.2 billion acquisition of Zendesk, an award-winning provider of software-as-a-service products.
GIC, as part of an investor group including Hellman & Friedman, Bain Capital Private Equity and Bain Capital Tech Opportunities, in connection with the US$17 billion acquisition of athenahealth, a leading provider of cloud-based enterprise software solutions for medical groups and health systems nationwide.
GIC, the sovereign wealth fund of Singapore, on the reported US$34 billion acquisition by an investor group, including Blackstone, The Carlyle Group and Hellman & Friedman, of Medline, a deal reported to be the second-largest buyout since the financial crisis and one of the largest healthcare buyouts ever.
MiddleGround Capital in its acquisition of Arrow Tru-Line, Inc.
GIC in the acquisition, along with Stone Point Capital, of Ascensus, a retirement and college savings provider.
Harvest Capital Credit Corporation in its merger with and into Portman Ridge Finance Corporation.
Ahead Inc. in connection with its sale to Centerbridge Partners and contemporaneous acquisitions of RoundTower Technologies and Kovarus.
Ahead Inc. in connection with several add-on acquisitions.
Quilvest Capital Partners and its portfolio company, Command Alkon, a construction supplier collaboration platform, in the sale of Command Alkon to private equity firm Thoma Bravo.
OHA Investment Corporation, a publicly traded business development company managed by Oak Hill Advisors, L.P., in its merger with and into Portman Ridge Finance Corporation.
GIC in its acquisition of a substantial equity stake (along with Silver Lake) in Ancestry.com, a provider of online family history data and personal DNA testing, and the subsequent sale by the investor consortium of Ancestry.com to Blackstone for US$4.7 billion.
GIC in connection with the merger of Ultimate Software and Kronos Incorporated for an enterprise value of US$22 billion.
GIC in the US$27 billion sale of Refinitiv by a consortium (consisting of Blackstone, an affiliate of GIC, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board and Thomson Reuters) to London Stock Exchange Group plc, representing the largest PE exit in 2019, according to Bloomberg.
GIC, as part of a consortium led by Blackstone that includes GIC and Canada Pension Plan Investment Board on a partnership agreement with Thomson Reuters for Refinitiv (f/k/a Thomson Reuters’ Financial & Risk (F&R) business) at an overall valuation of US$20 billion, which, according to Refinitiv, is the second largest private equity-backed acquisition in the past three years (at the time it announced).
Cinépolis, a Mexico-based cinema exhibitor, on its proposed acquisition of Moviehouse & Eatery, an upscale dine-in movie theatre circuit in Texas.
GIC, as part of a Hellman & Friedman-led investor consortium (including GIC, Blackstone, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, JMI Equity and other investors) in the US$11 billion take-private acquisition of Nasdaq-listed Ultimate Software.
Encompass Digital Media in its acquisition of Babcock International Group’s Media Services business.
Kinross Gold Corporation in its acquisition of two Brazilian hydroelectric power plants through its wholly-owned subsidiary Kinross Brasil Mineraçao.
Cinemex Holdings USA, Inc. in its acquisition of Cobb Theaters, a modern, premium circuit of 28 theater locations across the southeastern United States.
Laguna Dairy, S.A. de C.V., a multinational fresh fluid dairy processor based in Mexico, in the sale of Borden to ACON Investments, LLC via an equity recapitalization.
Grupo Mexico SAB de CV’s transportation business unit, GMéxico Transportes S.A. de C.V, in its acquisition of the Florida East Coast Railway Holdings Corp, a freight transportation business headquartered in Coral Gables, Florida.
Affiliates of Bregal Partners in connection with its investment in American Seafoods Group, LLC, the largest harvester of wild-caught fish for human consumption in the United States, as part of a broader deleveraging recapitalization of American Seafoods Group, LLC.
GIC, the sovereign wealth fund of Singapore, in its US$350 million investment in Kronos Inc., a company focused on delivering workforce management solutions in the cloud, as part of a broader recapitalization of Kronos.
Court Square Capital Partners in a number of its transactions, including the US$1.12 billion sale of the Harvard Drug Group to Cardinal Health Inc., and various portfolio company acquisitions.
Compañía Perforadora de México S.A.P.I. de C.V. (PEMSA), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Grupo México S.A.B. de C.V., in five acquisitions of jackup rigs and drilling platforms for a total value of approximately US$1 billion for use in oil exploration and drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.
Celgene Corporation in its 2015 acquisition of Quanticel Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a privately held biotechnology company focused on cancer drug discovery for US$100 million at closing and an additional earnout of US$385 million.
Switzerland-based Ferring Pharmaceuticals in its 2014 acquisition of DDAVP® (desmopressin acetate) from Sanofi.
R-Pharm US in its acquisition of the breast cancer drug Ixempra (ixabepilone) from Bristol-Myers Squibb.
Tekla Capital Management LLC and its affiliates in a broad range of investments in private biotechnology companies.
Sweden-based Orexo AB in its sale of the rights to the pharmaceutical product Abstral in the United States to Galena Biopharma, Inc.
A global asset manager in its acquisition of a leading provider of fixed-income indexing solutions.
CorpBanca, a Chilean bank, and its majority shareholders, in connection with a US$225 million investment from the International Finance Corporation (IFC) and certain of its affiliated funds.
Lead counsel for an ad hoc group of creditors of Chilean bus operator Inversiones Alsacia, S.A. in bondholder matters relating to litigation and insolvency proceedings in Chile and the United States