‘Ben Ward is a strong up and coming lawyer - he has an excellent grasp of the technicals and attention to detail.’Legal 500 2023
Overview
Ben Ward is a senior associate in Mayer Brown’s Restructuring practice in London. He has experience acting on domestic and cross-border restructurings and insolvencies for debtors, sponsors, funds, financial institutions, insolvency practitioners, CMBS special servicers, pension trustees and strategic investors in both contentious and non-contentious situations. Ben spent 10 months on secondment at EQT Credit (now part of Bridgepoint Credit) supporting the Mid-Market lending and Credit Opportunities strategies, dealing with special situations, restructurings, and mid-market direct lending.
Areas of Focus
Experience
- Acting for Mount Street as Special Servicer of the £350m Atlas Hotels CMBS on all aspects of their role as Special Servicer, including contingency planning and negotiating a restructuring.
- Acting for AlixPartners as administrators of the Argyll Club Group, the provider of flexible office space, on all aspects of the administration including the appointment, refinancing and exit.
- Acting for Mount Street as Special Servicer of the £90m Maroon CMBS on all aspects of their role as Special Servicer, including enforcement and workout advice.
- Advising the trustees of the pension schemes of various retailers in restructuring scenarios.
- Advising Permira Debt Managers on the restructuring of loveholidays.
- Acting for the Pizza Express group in connection with its restructuring of its senior secured and senior notes using the new UK restructuring plan procedure.*
- Advising Travelodge Hotels Limited on the formulation and implementation of its company voluntary arrangement.*
- Advising the ad-hoc committee of holders of convertible bonds on all aspects of the restructuring of the Steinhoff group.*
- Advising Agrokor d.d. (now known as Fortenova Grupa) and its special administrators in its restructuring of more than EUR 6 billion through a Croatian extraordinary administration process and associated recognition proceedings in England and across the Balkan region.*
- Acting for PwC as administrators of Lehman Brothers Limited in the Waterfall I litigation proceedings in the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court to address a number of complex issues of insolvency law arising in the administration of Lehman Brothers’ European trading company.*
- Acting for a large credit fund on the enforcement of its Luxembourg law security and acquisition of the business in a direct lending situation in respect of a PE-owned European telecoms group.*
- Acting for KPMG as liquidators of an investment company in wrongful trading proceedings.*
- Acting for various officeholders in administration and liquidation proceedings.
- Assisting various funds, investment banks and private equity houses in relation to their diligence of European investment opportunities in stressed and distressed transactions.
* experience gained prior to joining Mayer Brown
Perspectives
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December 152022
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October 252022
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July 072022
News
Admissions
- England and Wales
- Listed as a key lawyer for Corporate Restructuring & Insolvency, ‘Ben Ward is a strong up and coming lawyer - he has an excellent grasp of the technicals and attention to detail.’ (Legal 500 2023/24).