Pre-Transaction Restructuring Handbook
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
PRE-TRANSACTION RESTRUCTURING HANDBOOK Pre-Transaction Restructuring Handbook Baker & McKenzie ©Baker & McKenzie 2012 All rights reserved. IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: This Handbook is not intended to be a comprehensive exposition of all potential issues arising in the context of a pre-transaction restructuring, nor of the law relating to such issues. It is not offered as advice on any particular matter and should not be taken as such. The precedent documents included in the Handbook have not been prepared with any particular transaction in mind. Baker & McKenzie, the editors and the contributing authors disclaim all liability to any person in respect of anything done and the consequences of anything done or permitted to be done or omitted to be done wholly or partly in reliance upon the whole or part of this Handbook. Before any action is taken or decision not to act is made, specific legal advice should be taken in light of the relevant circumstances and no reliance should be placed on the statements made or documents reproduced in this Handbook. This publication is copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of private study or research permitted under applicable copyright legislation, no part may be reproduced or transmitted by any process or means without the prior permission of the editors. Save where otherwise indicated, law and practice are stated as at 29 February 2008. Baker & McKenzie International is a Swiss Verein with member law firms around the world. In accordance with the common terminology used in professional service organizations, reference to a “partner” means a person who is a partner, or equivalent, in such a law firm. Similarly, reference to an “office” means an office of any such law firm. This may qualify as “Attorney Advertising” requiring notice in some jurisdictions. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome. Table of Contents Section 1 Introduction . .1 Section 2 Pre-transaction restructuring: Overview of key issues and process for managing the project.................................3 Section 3 Tax planning for the spun-off group .............................18 Section 4 Tax planning for the separation steps: Which method of separation is best? .........................................25 Section 5 Separation methods: Business and asset sales and capital contributions of assets . 31 Section 6 Separation methods: Demergers and statutory spin-offs ..............43 Section 7 Separation methods: Reverse spin-offs ...........................81 Section 8 Moving companies into the new structure: Sale vs. capital contribution....................................83 Section 9 Identifying the Most Effective Form of Entity for the Asset or Business Transfer.................................136 Section 10 Restructuring issues raised by branches and representative offices ....144 Section 11 Employment considerations...................................146 Section 12 Stock options and other equity compensation issues................160 Section 13 Intellectual Property Considerations ............................167 Section 14 Transition services and other post-separation matters...............178 Baker & McKenzie Offices Worldwide........................................180 Baker & McKenzie’s Pre-Transaction Restructuring Handbook Section 1 – Overview Section 1 Introduction The aim of this Handbook is to provide a reference tool for companies that may either be contemplating, or in the process of executing, a multinational spin-off or separation of a division, line of business or other assets into a separate corporate structure. The Handbook provides a guide to the process of identifying the legal and tax issues to be addressed in planning and implementing the restructuring on a global basis. These reorganizations and the related transactions are frequently transformational or “once in a lifetime” projects for a multinational group and one of the major challenges that a company will face is to look ahead to the final transaction and the end state of the group, e.g., the public listing of a division and anticipate early enough the requirements and needs of that final transaction and the resulting business. The following chapters focus on a hypothetical parent company, having subsidiaries and branches in multiple foreign countries, that has identified a target line of business to be separated out from the company’s other businesses. The target line of business has assets and employees in many of these foreign jurisdictions, and, in each relevant jurisdiction, the target assets and employees are initially held by the same legal entities as the rest of the company’s business operations. Thus, for example, in each of twenty jurisdictions the company may have one or more subsidiaries, branches or other business presences, and the target assets are co-mingled in these local legal entities with the assets of the company’s other divisions. In our example, the company intends to establish a new holding company immediately below the ultimate parent company of the corporate group, and to transfer the target assets and employees into that holding company or into subsidiaries and branches beneath it. The eventual goal may be to sell the holding company to a potential buyer or investor, to distribute shares of the holding company to the ultimate parent company’s shareholders in a spin-off transaction, or to accomplish one of many other strategic business goals. In broad-brush terms, the separation process involves: • determining what type of corporate structure is best for the target business; • determining the most tax and cost efficient and least disruptive way to separate out the target business’s assets; • setting up the new corporate structure complete with subsidiaries, branches, and representative offices; • identifying the assets, employees, intellectual property, liabilities, and other items that have to be moved, kept or shared; • effecting the transfer while making sure that the operation of the business is not disrupted and all necessary licenses and permits are in place; Baker & McKenzie 1 Baker & McKenzie’s Pre-Transaction Restructuring Handbook Section 1 – Overview • putting a process in place to settle any open questions about what assets and liabilities belong to which business unit; and • putting in place agreements between the existing and spun-off businesses to address shared services, post-split transactions and ongoing business relationships. The issues raised in this Handbook may apply to a parent company in any jurisdiction, though a number of examples highlight issues particularly relevant to companies headquartered in the United States. 2 Baker & McKenzie Baker & McKenzie’s Pre-Transaction Restructuring Handbook Section 2 – Pre-Transaction Restructuring: Overview of Key Issues Section 2 Pre-transaction restructuring: Overview of key issues and process for managing the project This Section provides an overview of the process that typically ensures success in managing global pre-transaction restructuring projects, and then provides a brief summary of the more common substantive issues companies are likely to encounter in planning and implementing such projects. Several of the key issues discussed in this overview are covered in more depth in subsequent Sections of the Handbook. 1. An Open and Interactive Process A large restructuring project raises issues of both process management and substantive expertise. Moreover, once a restructuring plan has been developed, practical implementation issues will often prove critical in determining how quickly the plan can be effected and how soon the benefits of the restructuring can be realized. In particular, human resource concerns, corporate and tax law issues, financial due diligence and all audit requirements regulatory approval and filing requirements should be built into the planning process itself, and not be left to the implementation phase, in order to avoid road-blocks that might otherwise delay or frustrate the realization of restructuring goals in many jurisdictions. Furthermore, the planning process should also extend to the structuring of ongoing business operations for the target line of business. The business that is being separated out should be run with the end goal in sight. So, for example, form customer agreements may need to be revised in order to ensure that they can be readily assigned, and entering into long-term contracts of any kind may need to be subjected to a special review process. Outside advisors are typically used in this type of project because of their specialized experience and expertise, because a company’s permanent staff often is best used in other ways that relate more directly to the daily business operations of the company, and because confidentiality concerns may make it desirable to minimize the number of people within the company who are told about the proposed restructuring and the final transaction, particularly at the outset. However, internal staff are the best (indeed for the most part the only) source of the information that is critical to creating an effective implementation plan. In particular, they have the historical perspective of the operational, tax, financial corporate and business planning background of many of the existing structures and business operations, and ultimately must be sufficiently familiar with the separation plan so that they can both assist in its implementation and be in a position to manage and sustain the structure that results at the end of the process. It is vital to involve