Akin Gump Advises Royalty Pharma in Creation of $762 Million UK Investment Trust

(New York) – Pharmakon Advisors, LP has announced the successful initial public offering (IPO) of BioPharma Credit PLC with gross proceeds of $762 million and its admission to trading on the Specialist Fund Segment of the London Stock Exchange. Akin Gump advised Royalty Pharma and its Pharmakon affiliate on U.S. tax and legal issues in the matter.

BioPharma Credit PLC will have $339 million in seed assets, comprising loans secured by royalties and other cash flows from sales of close to 30 life sciences products, plus an additional $423 million in cash proceeds raised from a broad range of UK and European institutional investors. Seed assets were acquired pursuant to tender offers to U.S. and foreign investors in funds managed by Royalty Pharma and Pharmakon. Offers and sales in the IPO were made outside the United States to non-U.S. persons and privately in the United States to qualified purchasers who are also accredited investors.

The Akin Gump team was led by corporate partner David Antheil, investment management partner Mark Barth and tax partner Stuart Leblang, who co-heads the practice. They were joined by the following individuals:

• tax partners Olivier De Moor and Bruce Simonetti; senior counsel Kevin M. Rowe, Michael Roebuck, Jonathan Pavlich and Miriam Foley; counsel Eric Wexler; and associate Amanda Lui
• investment management counsel Kerry Potter McCormick and Marc Palumbo and associates Theresa Perkins, Bill Meehan and Libbie Walker
• corporate partners Meng Ru, Trey Muldrow and Bruce Mendelsohn; senior counsel Daniel Zimmerman; counsel Timothy Clark; and associate Brittany Harrison
• litigation counsel Chris Poon

Founded in 1945, Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP is a leading international law firm with more than 900 lawyers in offices throughout the United States, Europe, Asia and the Middle East.

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