Willkie has an extensive background in the area of education, representing numerous colleges, universities, charter schools and other educational providers.
Experience
Educational Publishing Company: Represent a steering committee of first lien lenders of a leading educational Canadian publisher active in all areas of publishing (K-12, higher education, professional learning, business, industry and other markets) in connection with the publisher’s out-of-court restructuring efforts.
Edison Schools, Inc.: Played a key role in the accounting matters investigation of Edison, a for-profit education management organization that contracts with school districts for performance partnerships, alliances, and charter school establishment.
Mount Sinai School of Medicine: Represented MSSM in negotiations and entry into a license agreement to settle multi-national patent infringement actions involving Shire’s Replagal product.
Ardian/AD Education: Represented Ardian in the acquisition of a majority stake in AD Education, a European education platform specialized in arts, digital and audiovisual.
Ardian/AD Education/SAE Institute: Represented Ardian and its portfolio company AD Education on the acquisition of the European operations of SAE Institute, a leader in audiovisual and creative media higher education.
ASG/Alpine Investors/ImageQuix/Charlesbank Capital Partners: Represented ASG, a portfolio company of Alpine Investors, in its sale of ImageQuix to Charlesbank Capital Partners.
Avista Capital Partners/Spear Education: Represented Avista Capital Partners in its acquisition of Spear Education, a provider of clinical training, practice analytics and consulting solutions for the dental market.
BIM/Novétude Santé: Represented BIM on the sale of Novetude Santé, a specialist of healthcare education to Charterhouse Capital Partners.
Bridge Growth Partners/Finalsite: Represented Bridge Growth Partners, LLC in its acquisition of Finalsite, a leading SaaS-based learning and communications platform for U.S. and international schools.
Edcetera: Represented Edcetera, a portfolio company of Eden Capital, in its acquisition of Pulse Radiology, a pre-licensure and continuing education provider for Radiologic Technologists.
Eurazeo/Glion Institute of Higher Education/Les Roches International School of Hotel Management: Represented Eurazeo on the financing aspects of its CHF 380 million acquisition of Glion Institute of Higher Education and Les Roches International School of Hotel Management.
Fidelity National Information Services, Inc./SunGard: Represented Fidelity National Information Services, Inc. (FIS) in its agreement to sell SunGard’s Public Sector and Education businesses to Vista Equity Partners for $850 million.
Finalsite/School Website: Represented Finalsite, a Bridge Growth Partners portfolio company, in its acquisition of School Website, the largest SaaS-based CMS software provider to schools in the UK.
Franchise Group/Sylvan Learning: Represented Franchise Group in its acquisition of Sylvan Learning.
Frontline Education/Thoma Bravo: Represented Frontline Education, an integrated insights partner serving more than 12,000 educational organizations across America, in its agreement to be acquired by private equity firm Thoma Bravo, with Insight Venture Partners retaining a minority stake in the company.
IK Investment Partners/Domia Group: Represented IK Investment Partners in connection with its acquisition, through its IK Small Cap I Fund, of Domia Group, the owner of Acadomia (the number one French player in the private tutoring market) from Metric Capital Partners.
Insight Partners/ Achieve3000/McGraw Hill/Platinum Equity: Represented Insight Partners and Achieve3000 in Achieve3000’s sale to McGraw Hill, a portfolio company of Platinum Equity.
Insight Venture Partners/Ministry Brands: Advised Insight in its investment in Ministry Brands, a provider of end-to-end cloud-based technology for faith-based organizations and educational institutions.
Ministry Brands/Reverence Capital Partners: Represented Ministry Brands in a majority investment from Reverence Capital Partners.
NPM Capital/Infinitas Learning: Represented NPM Capital in its acquisition of Infinitas Learning, a leading provider of products and services designed for education and learning.
NYU Medical School, Weizmann Institute of Science (Israel), University of Pennsylvania, the University of Colorado, Oregon Health Sciences University, the Max Planck Institute (Germany): Advised leading academic and research institutions in matters regarding (a) the negotiation of license agreements for the licensing of patented technology of the universities to pharmaceutical or biotechnology companies, (b) the negotiation of individual or multi-project sponsored research agreements between universities and industrial partners, or (c) the receipt by the universities as consideration for their licenses of various forms of equity interests in early stage companies formed to exploit the inventions made at the universities.
Platinum Equity/McGraw Hill: Financing counsel to Platinum Equity in its $4.5 billion acquisition of McGraw Hill, a global leader in educational content and digital platforms, from Apollo Funds.
Qualium Investissement/BPI Investissement/Early Makers Group: Represented Qualium Investissement in relation to its acquisition alongside BPI Investissement of a stake in Early Makers Group (emlyon business school).
Schaffhausen Institute of Technology/Jacobs University Bremen: Represented Schaffhausen Institute of Technology in its acquisition of the majority shares of Jacobs University Bremen.
Warburg Pincus/ACAMS: Represented Warburg Pincus and the Association of Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialists (ACAMS) in the $330 million sale of ACAMS to Becker Professional Education.
SUNY Albany: Provided senior executive representation on employment matters for SUNY Albany, one of the main institutions in New York State’s university system.
St. John's University/Amity University: Represented St. John's University in the sale of its 170-acre Oakdale property to Amity University, a nonprofit international educational organization, and the leaseback of a portion of the campus.
Two Sigma/Lease of Cornell's Roosevelt Island Campus: Represented Two Sigma Investments, LP in the first third-party lease for space at The Bridge at Cornell Tech, a new building on Cornell University’s under-construction Roosevelt Island Technology Campus.