Pinsent Masons advises AMC on US$900m acquisition of Nordic Cinema Group

The Scandinavian and Baltic cinema chain, NCG, operates 68 theatres and has a substantial minority interest in another 50 associated theatres to which NCG provides a variety of shared services. NCG’s theatres are number one by market share in Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania and take second place by the same metric in Norway. The acquisition will further strengthen AMC's current position of being the largest cinema operator in the United States, the largest cinema operator in Europe and the largest cinema operator in the world.

The Pinsent Masons team, which was led by private equity partner Tom Leman and comprised John Tyerman, James Kaye and Ben Elliott, worked with Swedish law firm Lindahl, with a team led by Anders Moberg, and assisted by Carl Axel Morvay and Erik Sundgren.

AMC CEO and President, Adam Aron, comments:

“For the third time in the past twelve months, we believe we have discovered a substantial acquisition that gives AMC yet another opportunity to further expand and diversify our geographic reach and more firmly establish AMC as the undisputed leader in movie exhibition worldwide.”

Tom Leman says:

“We are delighted to have teamed up with AMC for the second time in six months to deliver a substantial transaction in a short timeframe. The deal adds significant weight to AMC's European operations and we look forward to working on the next phase of integration. In particular I would like to thank our friends at Lindahl who worked tirelessly over the Christmas and New Year period to deliver the diligence and local legal counsel in such a comprehensive and commercial manner.”

The transaction is conditional upon antitrust clearance by the European Commission.

White & Case and Mannheimer Swartling advised Bridgepoint, Roschier Attorneys advised Bonnier Holding and the NCG management team was advised by Hansen Law and Michelmores LLP.