Gavin O'Flaherty

Practice Areas

Gavin is a Partner in the Corporate Department and has extensive transactional experience over 18 years.

He has an extensive practice area in advising on corporate law, mergers and acquisitions, corporate reorganizations, venture capital and private equity investments. Within his general corporate and M&A practice Gavin has a particular sectoral focus on advising emerging, technology, agri-food and healthcare companies. Gavin also acts for large foreign corporates on their Irish legal needs such as Virtus Health, Pollen Street Capital and Avery Dennison and also to Irish corporates such as Arachas Corporate Brokers and Planet Payment.

Career

As part of his technology practice, Gavin acts on behalf of a number of high potential emerging and start-up companies across all stages of their corporate development such as ChannelSight Limited, Pilot Photonics and Bio-Marine Ingredients.

Gavin extensively advises on foreign direct investment into Ireland and is currently advising a number of US companies and venture capital houses on their investments into the Irish market.

Gavin also works closely with our aviation finance practice who he supports along with his existing work with clients in the area such as Shannon Engine Support Limited and Delta Airlines.

Gavin has qualified from the Irish Taxation Institute as a Chartered Tax Adviser and uses his tax and legal expertise to work closely with our tax group in advising on corporate restructurings/reorganizations and also on the tax effects of corporate transactions and investments into Ireland.

He also lectures extensively to the Law Society of Ireland, the Institute of Taxation in Ireland and other professional bodies. He is also listed in the Who's Who Legal for the practice area of M&A and Corporate Governance.

Professional Memberships

Gavin is a member of the Business Law Committee of the Law Society of Ireland.

Experience

Examples of Gavin’s recent experience include:

- acted for Sovereign Capital on its investment into Arachas Corporate Brokers which we then led on advising on a number of transactions including on their acquisition of Capital Cover Group Limited, Alan B. Kidd & Co. Limited together with its subsidiary Eugene P Corrigan Limited and Cover Centre Insurance Group. We then acted for the shareholders on the sale of the Arachas Group to the joint funds of Madison Dearborn Partners and HPS for a reported consideration in excess of EUR250m

- acted for Busy Bees (a portfolio company of the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Fund) in the acquisition of Giraffe Childcare Group, one of the largest childcare groups operating in the Irish market

- acted for Carousel Logistics, a portfolio company of Livingbridge Capital, on its acquisition of BDA Acquisitions and its group of companies

- acted for H2 Equity Partners, the Dutch private equity house, in relation to its acquisitions of Healthcare 21 and the Aquilant target group

- acted for Aston Lark, formerly a portfolio company of Bowmark Capital and now a portfolio company of Goldman Sachs, on their separate investments into the Robertson Lowe Insurance group and the Wright Insurance Group

- acted for Pollen Street Capital, as the majority owner of Specialist Risk Investments Limited, on the double acquisition of The Underwriting Exchange, a dual located specialist insurance intermediary operating in the Irish and UK market

- acted for MML Growth Capital, one of the largest providers of growth capital in the Irish market, on its investment into Eastland Engineering Supply Co Limited

- acted for the shareholders of Greenogue Investments Limited in respect of its sale to Enva, a portfolio company of Exponent

- advised on an investment in Enova Energy Limited by Mitsui, the Japanese trading and investment conglomerate. This transaction also involved advising on intra-shareholder arrangements and interaction with our tax team

- acted for Assa Abloy, a Swedish headquartered national group, on its acquisition of HKC, the leading manufacturer of alarms and cloud based monitoring solutions, based in Ireland

- acted in relation to the investment by Gallant Capital, a US West Coast based private equity house, on its investment in the Reveal Data Group of companies

- advised the shareholders in Adaptics Limited t/a Drop through various fundraising rounds, corporate transactions and the completion of Series A Fundraising from the US West Coast based VC, Alsop Louie

- acted for the shareholders in Blue Insurance Limited in respect of the sale of the majority of its share capital to Covermore Insurance, a member of the Zurich group of companies

- acted for Arachas Corporate Brokers on a number of transactions including on their acquisition of Capital Cover Group Limited, Alan B. Kidd & Co. Limited together with its subsidiary Eugene P Corrigan Limited and Cover Centre Insurance Group. Our tax team worked with us on these transactions

- acted for the shareholders of Greenogue Investments Limited on their successful MBO in early 2017, whereby the management team of the Rilta/Clearcircle Group bought a majority stake in the Rilta Group from One51 Group plc. We then acted for the Rilta Environmental and ClearCircle group in respect of its sale to Enva, a portfolio company of Exponent, the UK-based private equity house

- acted for Aston Lark, a portfolio company of Bowmark Capital, on its conditional investment in the Robertson Lowe Insurance group

- acts for Virtus Health, an Australian listed healthcare company, on a number of recent transactions to include the acquisition of the Sims and HARI fertility clinics in Ireland, the Aagard clinic in Denmark and the recent acquisition of Complete Fertility Limited which operates an NHS IVF Clinic in Southampton, England