McDermott Advises American Color Graphics, Inc. in Acquisition by Vertis, Inc.
NEW YORK (June 5, 2008) — McDermott Will & Emery represented American Color Graphics, Inc. in connection with its proposed merger with Vertis, Inc. and the proposed comprehensive debt restructuring of both companies. American Color, based in Nashville, Tennessee, and Vertis, based in Baltimore, Maryland, are two of the leading printers of newspaper advertising inserts and providers of other pre-media and direct mail advertising in the United States. The combined companies will have total revenues of more than $1.8 billion for 2008.
The transaction involves the restructuring of five separate series of second lien, high yield and mezzanine debt ($1.3 billion) and related consent solicitations, as well as two separate debtor in possession refinancings of five different first lien credit facilities ($410 million) and a new first lien exit financing. The transaction will be accomplished through simultaneous coordinated pre-packaged chapter 11 filings and a merger of the two companies. American Color is a private equity investment of Morgan Stanley Capital Partners. Vertis is a private equity investment of Thomas H. Lee Equity Fund.
The McDermott team was led by John Herbert with assistance from Tom Giegerich, Rachel Flamm, Madeline Chiampou, Jonathan Boyles, Ed Christian, Chris Service, Daphne Trotter, Joel Grosberg and Stephen Selbst.
McDermott's M&A Practice Group represents a wide spectrum of publicly and privately held businesses from Global 50 companies to venture backed start-ups, as well as private equity funds and investment banks. As a globally integrated team, our lawyers manage complex transactions with components in multiple jurisdictions throughout the world.
