Divjak, Topic, Bahtijarevic & Krka, working alongside Allen & Overy, has advised J&T Bank, the arranger on a public offering of senior secured bonds. 

D’Ornano Partners has advised the Groupama Group on its acquisition of the entire share capital of OTP Osiguranje, an insurance company owned by the OTP Bank in Croatia. Ivekovic Attorneys at Law reportedly acted as local advisors to Groupama. Schoenherr’s Hungarian office reportedly advised the seller on the deal. 

Divjak Topic Bahtijarevic & Krka and Eisenberger & Herzog have advised the Austrian energy company Kelag on its acquisition of the Orjak wind farm in Croatia from BayWa. Tokic Ivic Sverak reportedly advised the seller on the deal.

Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer has advised the Copenhagen-based payment services provider Nets and its majority owner, Hellman & Friedman, on the EUR 7.8 billion all-share merger of Nets into Italy’s paytech group Nexi. ODI Law acted as local advisor to Nexi in Slovenia and Croatia.

Now the necessary supervisory and legislative prerequisites have been fulfilled, the European Central Bank Governing Council has adopted a decision to establish close cooperation with the Croatian National Bank. As a result, Croatia has joined the Single Supervisory Mechanism and the Single Resolution Mechanism, whose members include all the Euro-area states that already enjoy close cooperation with the European Central Bank. This means, among other things, that from 1 October 2020, the European Central Bank will directly supervise many important Republic of Croatia institutions.

Following three rounds of changes to Croatia’s tax system in recent years to ease business and reduce the overall tax burden, the Government announced plans to further relax the tax system in 2021.

It has become evident by now that the 2020 global pandemic has reshaped many aspects of the legal industry, with one of the eminent examples being the way M&A transactions are carried out – almost everything has become less certain, more urgent, and largely virtual. As though the circumstances have not been challenging enough, recent developments in local jurisprudence concerning the form of legal documents have started to negatively impact M&A deals in Croatia.

It is now more than obvious how much the COVID-19 pandemic has shaken up both global and national economies. Although various measures have already been undertaken to support businesses during this COVID-19 crisis, financial distress of many companies is inevitable, which will ultimately, for many of them, result in bankruptcy or restructuring.

Advertising is no easy task for law firms in the former Yugoslavia, and law firm marketing and business development specialists in those legal markets face unique challenges in their attempts to promote their firms and obtain new clients.

Marohnic, Tomek & Gjoic has advised LCN Capital Partners on its acquisition of five Emmezeta retail and warehouse units in Croatia. Josip Martinic in cooperation with Wolf Theiss reportedly advised the seller on the deal.

Cipcic-Bragadin Mesic & Associates has advised Pfizer on a global business combination with Mylan N.V. The transaction involved a spin-off of Pfizer’s Upjohn business and a subsequent merger of that business with Mylan N.V. to form a new global generics company, called "Viatris." Bird & Bird was global lead counsel to Pfizer, with Karanovic & Partners providing local support for Serbia and Jadek & Pensa providing local support in Slovenia. 

"The Croatian government is a bit under fire right now for not implementing stricter measures to deal with the uptick in Covid cases,” reports Kallay & Partners Partner Mara Terihaj Macura. Still, she concedes it’s a difficult problem. “There are still businesses that are open and operating despite the numbers being higher now than they were in the spring – but according to the economic experts another lockdown would be disastrous for the economy, so it’s difficult to find the balance.” 

Earlier this month, the Croatian Competition Agency confirmed that Coca Cola HBC Hrvatska d.o.o. had complied with the commitments the company had offered, and which had been accepted by the CCA, in the course of an investigation of vertical restraints imposed by Coca Cola on its distributors (most notably exclusive purchasing and tying arrangements). Early on, the CCA expressed concern that Coca Cola’s practices would constitute infringements under Articles 8 and 13 of the Croatian Competition Act (essentially corresponding to Articles 101 and 102 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union).

While the COVID-19 pandemic has caused disruption to nearly all businesses in the logistics and manufacturing sectors in Central and Eastern Europe, enough time has now lapsed that identifiable trends and opportunities are beginning to emerge. CMS Partners Ana-Marija Skoko, Ivan Gazdic, Iain Batty, and Lukas Hejduk agreed to share their thoughts about the effect of the COVID-19 crisis on logistics and manufacturing developments in their local markets and across CEE.

According to its website, Budapest-based InvestCEE aims to “humanize technology” for lawyers and provides services to law firms and in-house counsel in Hungary, Romania, Croatia, Poland, and the Czech Republic.

DTB has advised US-based Devolver Digital on its acquisition of 100% of the shares of Croatian independent game development company Croteam. Krehic & Partners in cooperation with Deloitte Legal advised Croteam on the deal.

Former Karanovic & Partners Partner Patricia Gannon has announced the establishment of Gannon Advisory, which she describes as "a holistic strategic advisory business."

Schoenherr has advised S Immo AG on the acquisition of the Zagrebtower office complex from CA Immobilien Anlagen AG. CMS advised the sellers on the deal.