Kirkland Represents NMC Healthcare on $7.6 Billion Restructuring
Kirkland & Ellis advised NMC Healthcare, via its joint administrators, on its successful $7.6 billion financial restructuring which completed on 25 March 2022.
NMC Healthcare is the largest private healthcare provider in the United Arab Emirates. The group also held additional international healthcare assets.
The restructuring involved effectively equitizing all prepetition debt and successfully restored 34 of 36 group companies as going concerns.
The transaction involved a number of firsts. The insolvent companies, which were originally domiciled in various of the United Arab Emirates, were first migrated to the Abu Dhabi General Market (ADGM) to enable the joint administrators to be appointed to the business. After stabilising the group’s operations, the complex transaction was implemented via 35 parallel “deeds of company arrangement” available to companies within administration proceedings. The group also successfully obtained recognition of its ADGM administration proceedings in the UK under the Cross-Border Insolvency Regulations 2006, in the US under chapter 15 of the Bankruptcy Code, and in the Dubai International Financial Centre free zone.
The restructuring means all operations and each entity will continue to trade as normal. There will be no disruption to the ongoing trading of the NMC Group. Following the financial and operational restructuring, NMC emerges from administration delivering its best-ever operational and financial performance.
Richard Fleming, Managing Director of Alvarez & Marsal Europe LLP and Joint Administrator of NMC Health PLC and NMC Healthcare said: “This is a landmark moment for NMC and the Joint Administrators’ team. There were moments over the past two years where it was uncertain if NMC would survive, so to be able to hand over 34 companies to a New NMC Group under creditor ownership, as thriving healthcare businesses, is a remarkable achievement. The extraordinary support we have received from the staff, ADGM, courts across the Emirates, key stakeholders, insurance companies whose patients we serve, creditors and suppliers have been key over the past two years. As NMC goes about its business of serving clinical customers in the UAE and delivering value to its stakeholder communities, its future looks very bright indeed.”
The Kirkland team was led by restructuring partners Partha Kar and Lisa Stevens and associates Adam Watterson, Ben Isherwood, Patrick Mackenzie, Isabel Falkner, Seamus Vaughan Lucey and Sophia Rossi and capital markets partner Tim Volkheimer and associate Chrystel Marincich.
NMC Healthcare’s administrators are Richard Fleming and Ben Cairns, managing directors at Alvarez & Marsal Europe LLP.
