Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas Advises British American Tobacco Plc

Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas advised, its long-standing client British American Tobacco (“BAT”) Plc. on the strategic divestment of approx. 3.5 per cent stake held by Tobacco Manufacturers (India) Limited (TMI), a wholly owned subsidiary of BAT in ITC Limited (ITC). The deal is valued at approximately USD 2.1 billion, making it one of the largest ever trades on the Indian stock exchanges.

BAT has announced that it intends to use the net proceeds to commence its share buyback programme, starting with £ 700 million in 2024.

SAM & Co. team was led by Mithun V. Thanks, Partner; Manjari Tyagi, Partner; Kaustubh Verma, Partner; Shraddha Suryavanshi, Principal Associate; Deepika Goyal, Principal Associate; Doorva Tripathi, Associate; and Piyush Kaushal, Associate. Special acknowledgement to Gopalkrishna Sitaram Hegde, Consultant also, for providing guidance on the regulatory approvals.

BAT was advised by Herbert Smith Freehills, London led by partner Alex Kay and Appleby (Isle of Man) LLC on the governance, corporate aspects and the capacity and authority of TMI to undertake the Divestment.

Bank of America Securities India Limited (“BofA Securities”) and Citibank acted as the authorized dealer banks for the repatriation of the proceeds to BAT.

Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas advised BofA Securities and Citigroup Global Markets India Private Limited.

Ashurst LLP also advised BofA Securities on certain overseas aspects of the block trade.