Our Case Studies

Ellerine Furnishers (Pty) Ltd, a retailer of furniture and household appliances , commenced with Business Rescue in 2014. This has been the largest Business Rescue to date, based on the Public Interest score of the Company. The firm employed almost 8000 people and had operations in six African countries, comprising over 1000 stores.

In 2010 the provision of credit and financial services component was sold to African Bank. This resulted in a significant decrease in the Company’s income and profitability. A decision was taken that no further funding would be provided by ABIL or African Bank in August 2014 and it was thereafter resolved to place the company into Business Rescue.

Ellerine Furnishers held a deposit of R472million with African Bank that would have been utilised as Post Commencement Funding (PCF). However, the Bank was placed under Curatorship less than a week after the commencement of the Business Rescue. With no accessible funds in the bank accounts, there was an urgent need to secure PCF

PCF was eventually secured after extensive discussions with African Bank. Store closures, realisation of stock and sales of part of the business have all been carried out, saving approximately 2000 jobs to date.

The dividend paid to creditors to date has far exceeded the ‘best case’ dividend that creditors would have received in liquidation and it is estimated that the final dividend will be approximately 42c in the Rand.

GlassRatner Advisory & Capital Group, LLC was retained by the United States Department of Justice in its Clean Water Act penalty lawsuits against BP Exploration & Production, Inc., a subsidiary of BP p.l.c., and Anadarko Petroleum Corporation related to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. 

GlassRatner provided litigation support services and performed financial analyses regarding the economic impact on the defendants’ and each defendant’s ability to pay a multi-billion dollar penalty.  GlassRatner provided five separate reports in this matter, including rebuttal reports, and Mr. Ratner testified for over 6 hours during the multi-week trial. 

After the trial, BP Exploration & Production, Inc. entered into $20+ billion settlement with various governmental agencies.  This settlement included $5.5 billion for the Clean Water Act penalty.  A $160 million Clean Water Act penalty judgement was issued by the Court against Anadarko Petroleum Corporation, even though Anadarko had no operational involvement and was only an investor in the project.

Farber’s multi-disciplinary team were engaged by the private equity fund/shareholder to provide advice and guidance to the Board of Directors and management team as the Company operated through a financial and operational turnaround.

Our duties included assessing and building the management team, advising on all financial and cash flow implications as well as assisting in all aspects of operational performance improvement. 

Farber were able to develop strategy, including closing facilities and building sales capabilities and recruit a new CEO and sale staff, resulting in a 20% improvement in productivity and ensuring the cost of capital is optimised.  Farber are continuing to provide support for finance and operations of the business.

A receiver appointed by the court asked Zalis to guide a home builder ranked number 2 in France, out of its cash flow crisis.

Zalis assisted the management and shareholders to deal with a business slowdown, using a large operational team to audit the group (and its different business units spread across France) and to build an action plan to rescue the business.

The resulting action plan was implemented over a full year. Once the rescue had proved successful, a buyer was found for the company.

Zalis ran the restructuring of a French leader in the gambling industry. Daniel Cohen, CEO and founder of Zalis, and his team advised and supported the company in connection with its second equity capital raising and assisted in its operational and financial restructuring, in particular through an agreement reached with a large banking pool.

The support of Zalis resulted in a debt rescheduling (thereby avoiding asset sales in a difficult market), a new capital increase and a change in governance.

Improved financial results have confirmed a successful turnaround.

Deal origination and advisory services for two large U.S. Private Equity firms to enable them to become the anchor shareholders of a Tier 1 subcontractor in the aerospace industry.

Zalis identified a company with good fundamentals that was over-indebted and loss-making and had a highly diluted shareholder structure. In order to secure the future of the company, Zalis approached some investors with this opportunity. Two funds showed a strong interest and jointly hired Zalis to conduct a confidential industrial and strategic survey before making their investment decision. Some of the root causes behind the company’s underperformance were identified and the turnaround potential analysed.

Zalis advised the funds throughout the whole process. In particular, advising the U.S. investors on their relationships with the French Authorities. The management turnaround plan was challenged, and organizational improvements and measures to prevent the loss of skills were suggested. Finally, through a Debt to Equity swap and New Money investment, the two funds became anchor investors.

A financial institution was suspected by the United States Senate of being involved in money laundering, drug trafficking, and terrorist financing activities.

The local financial services regulator engaged us as an independent examiner to inspect the Cayman licensee’s compliance with the applicable anti-money laundering and counter financing of terrorism laws and regulations.

The investigation focused on whether the licensee had appropriate and sufficient anti-money laundering policies and procedures and adequate identification procedures.

Various issues arose during the inspection, which we were able to overcome and produce a comprehensive report for the regulator within the deadline imposed.

nicko cruises, the market leader for river cruises in Europe, had to file for insolvency before the start of the main season. The insolvency administrator, Mr. Michael Pluta from PLUTA Rechtsanwalts GmbH, managed to ensure that the tours in Europe, Africa and Asia took place until the end of the 2015 season. This means that the PLUTA team secured more than 30,000 tours, which was very difficult at the beginning. Moreover, the restructuring experts also optimised the capacity utilisation of the entire fleet and searched for an investor. With success: nicko cruises was acquired by the Portuguese holding company Mystic Invest which is active in the field of travel organisation. When business was restarted officially on 1 November 2015, the insolvency administrator’s team symbolically handed over the key to the new company.

Mr. Stephan Ammann, an attorney at PLUTA Rechtsanwalts GmbH, was involved in the proceedings for the assets of a real estate company with 2,400 residential and commercial properties. Now, almost two years after the opening of insolvency proceedings of BGP Immo-West S.à.r.l. & Co. KG, Stephan Ammann has succeeded in selling all the properties. The properties are located in seven cities in North Rhine-Westphalia and four cities in North Germany, including Duisburg, Essen, Bremen and Bremerhaven. Most of the real estate portfolio was acquired by the various fund companies belonging to the US American Ares Management L.P. In ten further individual transactions, Stephan Amman sold 674 residential units. The fact that the complete real estate portfolio was successfully sold in under two years shows that an insolvency may be the better option when it comes to making decisions in the interest of the creditors. The key to success in selling real estate portfolios of this size is a close cooperation with powerful and financially sound banks. In these proceedings, the mutual interest in achieving an optimal sale made a decisive contribution to a successful outcome since it ensured flexible portfolio management resulting in the lowest costs and the highest selling price possible.

The debtor-in-possession proceedings for the Osterhofen Specialist Clinic in the South of Germany with a workforce of almost 100 employees have been successfully completed. Mr. Stephan Ammann from PLUTA Rechtsanwalts GmbH acted as the insolvency monitor in these proceedings. Mr. Ammann and Mr. Ivo-Meinert Willrodt supported the successful restructuring and monitored the proceedings so as to prevent any disadvantages for the creditors. The clinic took advantage of this opportunity and, despite the crisis, even managed to set up a new department through targeted investment. A visible proof of success: the number of beds authorised by the Bavarian hospital plan and also the number of employees increased during the proceedings.