Cleary Gottlieb partners Chris Austin and Mark Nelson have been named “Dealmakers of the Year” by The American Lawyer for their roles advising clients on the most impressive and significant deals in 2019.
The publication highlights Chris’ role as counsel to National Amusements, Inc. in a complex merger that brought together CBS and Viacom, two separate companies that shared a single controlling stockholder. The successful merger, according to Am Law, “capped a four-year-long process filled with unsuccessful combination attempts, changes to the Viacom board, and litigation tied to the attempted reunification of the media conglomerates.”
Mark was recognized for advising T-Mobile and Deutsche Telekom on the antitrust aspects of T-Mobile US’s merger with Sprint Corporation, resulting in a company with a combined enterprise value of $146 billion, and obtaining U.S. Department of Justice and Federal Communications Commission clearance to combine the two “telecommunications giants.” These efforts, made challenging by the structure of the publicly traded companies controlled by foreign shareholders, included defending the client in a successful federal court trial that defeated the efforts of multiple state Attorneys General attempting to block the merger.
For more on The American Lawyer’s 2020 Dealmakers of the Year, click here. To read Chris’ profile, click here. To read Mark’s profile, click here.