Julian Pritchard

About Julian Pritchard

As head of Global Transactions, Julian leads the firm’s corporate transactional practice worldwide and previously led the firm’s London corporate practice.  

Julian focuses on complex public and private M&A transactions.

Julian has acted for many of the world’s leading corporations, private equity firms and investment banks.

Having also worked in New York and Tokyo, he has extensive experience of cross-border deals.

Julian was recently ranked in the Financial Times’ list of business leaders recognised for championing women in the work place, the FT HERoes List.  He is also a champion of Halo, the firm’s LGBT network and an ambassador for the firm’s black affinity network.

Recent work

Julian’s experience advising strategic clients includes the following representative transactions:

• Advising REA Group on its possible £6.2bn public takeover offer for Rightmove plc
• Advising SSE plc on the activist campaign by Elliott Management
• Advising Currys plc on the possible public takeover offers announced by Elliot Advisors and JD.com
• Advising UDG Healthcare plc on its public takeover by Clayton, Dubilier & Rice, valuing the company at £2.8bn
• Advising SSE plc on the disposal of a 25% interest in its transmission business to Ontario Teachers, in a transaction that values the business at c£6bn
• Advising SSE plc on the proposed spin off and merger of its retail business with Innogy's retail business, nPower and its subsequent sale to Ovo
• Advising Hewlett Packard Enterprise on the $8.8bn spin merger of its software business into Micro Focus plc
• Advising Hewlett Packard Enterprise on the acquisition of Red Pixie group
• Advising Honeywell on various transactions, including its potential acquisition of a substantial European technology business
• Advising Yara International on its $25bn merger talks with CF Industries
• Advising on Novartis' $5.4bn sale of its animal health business to Eli Lilly
• Advising on the $1.7bn acquisition of Morton Salt by K+S from Rohm and Haas, following its merger with Dow Chemical
• Advising on the £5.4bn public takeover offer for Canary Wharf by Brascan
• Advising on the £7bn separation and spin-off of O2 from BT
• Advising Barclays Global Investors on the disposal of its trust and banking arm to Sumitomo Trust
• Advising on Reed Elsevier’s proposed £20bn public merger with Wolters Kluwer
• Advising Amerada Hess on its £2.4bn public takeover offer for Lasmo
• Advising Kingfisher plc on its contested public takeover offer for VCI plc
• Advising Rentokil on its £2.1bn hostile public takeover offer for BET
• Advising BT Group on its joint venture with KDDI
• Advising on the £2.6bn sale of Scottish & Newcastle’s retail division to an investment vehicle led by TPG

Julian’s experience advising private equity clients includes the following representative transactions:

• Advising General Atlantic on the acquisition of shares in Argus Media Group from Hg Capital in a transaction valuing the company at $4.6bn
• Advising General Atlantic on its investment in UK unicorn Gymshark
• Advising General Atlantic in relation to its investment in Immunocore
• Advising on the leveraged recapitalisation of Universal Studios Japan led by Goldman Sachs PIA, resulting in the acquisition of a 51 per cent stake by NBC Universal and the subsequent sale of the remaining 49 per cent to NBCU
• Advising on the $3bn investment by Goldman Sachs PIA and co-investors in Sanyo Electric
• Advising Goldman Sachs PIA on its investment in Aruze
• Advising Goldman Sachs PIA on its investments in eMobile
• Advising Blackstone on the consensual reorganisation of O’Flynn Construction Group
• Advising on the $2.6bn disposal of Arysta LifeScience Corporation by Olympus Capital to Permira
• Advising Brascan (now Brookfield) on its £5.4bn takeover offer for Canary Wharf
• Advising TPG on various opportunities in Europe, including the sale of its Merin office platform in the Netherlands to Dream Global for €622m
• Advising Advent International on the £1.5bn sale of the Priory Group to Acadia Healthcare
• Advising Paine & Partners on the reorganisation of Eurodrip following its merger with Rivulis
• Advising BC Partners on its acquisition of Pharmathen