Kirkland Advises Renesas on Wolfspeed’s Restructuring Support Agreement
Kirkland & Ellis advised Renesas Electronics Corporation on an agreement with Wolfspeed Inc (NYSE: WOLF). Wolfspeed, as part of its efforts to proactively strengthen its capital structure, entered into a restructuring support agreement (RSA) with key lenders, including holders of more than 97% of its senior secured notes, Renesas Electronics Corporation’s wholly owned U.S. subsidiary and convertible debtholders holding more than 67% of the outstanding convertible notes. The transactions envisioned by the RSA are expected to reduce the company’s overall debt by approximately 70%, representing a reduction of approximately $4.6 billion and reduce the company’s annual total cash interest payments by approximately 60%. The RSA contemplates an exchange of $5.2 billion of existing convertible notes and Renesas’ existing loan for $500 million of new notes and 95% of the new common equity, subject to dilution from other equity issuances, with Renesas loan claims entitled to additional incremental consideration to the extent certain regulatory approvals are not obtained by an agreed upon deadline.
Read the transaction press release
The team included restructuring lawyers Steven Serajeddini, Yusuf Salloum, Claire Stephens, Ciara Foster, Olivia Acuña, Tiffani Chanroo, Jacob Black, Seth Sanders, Kyle Nolan Trevett, Gabrielle Abbe, Megan Feeney, John Henry Gibbons, Joshua Valletta, Daniel Wachenfeld, Quin Wetzel, Christopher Fabrizio, Devon Chenelle, Julia Fletcher, Tysan Holloman and Alexander Joseph Szarka; corporate lawyers Marshall Shaffer, Daniel Yip and Daniel Wolf; international trade & national security lawyers Ivan Schlager, Evan Sills, Erika Krum and Ellie Bacon; capital markets lawyers Rachel Sheridan, Shagufa Hossain, Anthony Sanderson, Drew Maliniak, Hunter Richey, Robbie Dillard and Maya Pierce; antitrust & competiton lawyers Satyen Dhana, Daniel Rosenthal, Stephanie Greco, Shahrzad Sadjadi, Enrica Schaefer, Loukia Kopitsa, Sarah Lonvick, Michael Cramer, Maximilian Greib, Bethany Thomas, Sara Jungewelter, Brady Sweet and Alexandra Iseghohi; debt finance lawyers Jason Kanner, Scott Rolnik, Matt Truedson and Andrew Koonce; and tax lawyers Sara Zablotney, Liam Murphy and Olivia Chilcott.
