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CMS Bureau Francis Lefebvre advises Advans SA and FMO on Lesthego's acquisition of a stake in Advans Bank Tanzania

11/01/2016

CMS Bureau Francis Lefebvre's Africa team advised Advans SA and FMO on the acquisition by Letshego Holdings Limited, a company listed on the Botswana stock market since 2002, of a majority stake in Advans Bank Tanzania following its subscription to a capital increase reserved for it and the purchase of shares. Advans SA and FMO, the founding shareholders of Advans Bank Tanzania, remain minority shareholders.

Advans Bank Tanzania, which began trading in 2011, now has five branches in Tanzania serving more than 20,000 customers. Letshego’s investment strengthens the bank's financial structure and provides necessary resources to improve its service to its target clientele, micro-enterprises and SMEs and low-income groups, by expanding its geographical coverage as well as the range of services offered.

Jean Jacques Lecat, partner and joint head of CMS Bureau Francis Lefebvre's Africa team, advised Advans SA on the transaction, as he has done in relation to the creation or acquisition of its nine institutions, as joint ventures with financial sector partners, in Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Nigeria, DRC, Tanzania, Tunisia, Cambodia and Pakistan.

The Linklaters LLP team, meanwhile, comprised Patrice Doat, partner, and Aurélien Fournier, advisor.

CMS Bureau Francis Lefebvre's Africa team has offices in Algiers, Casablanca and Paris. The team is led jointly by Jean-Jacques Lecat and Pierre Marly and includes around 40 advisors, lawyers and legal experts. The multi-disciplinary team of lawyers based in Paris, which has operated on the continent for more than 50 years, is dedicated exclusively to corporate projects in Africa. Its members are experts in business law and tax rules applicable in the continent's main countries. In some cases, they may be required to work with specialist CMS Africa teams.

You will find the complete press release attached or by following the link below: http://www.cms-bfl.com/CMS-Bureau-Francis-Lefebvre-conseille-Advans-SA-et-FMO-lors-de-lentree-de-Lesthego-au-capital-de-Advans-Bank-Tanzania-11-01-2016

About Advans SA

Advans SA was created in August 2005 as a SICAR. Advans SA is managed by Horus Development Finance, its founder shareholder. Other shareholders include the European Investment Bank (EIB), SFI (World Bank Group), KfW (German government-owned development bank), FMO (Dutch government-owned development bank), CDC Group (United Kingdom), FISEA (the investment and support fund for African companies – AFD Group). Its mission is to build a network of microfinance institutions (MFIs) to offer credit, deposit and other traditional financial services to micro-enterprises and SMEs in developing and emerging countries. The Advans group currently employees more than 4,500 people and services 550,000 clients in its nine MFIs.

About Letshego Holdings Limited

Letshego Holdings Limited, incorporated in 1998, offers micro-credit and consumer loans as well as deposit-taking services across nine countries in Southern and East Africa, in Botswana, Kenya, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia, Rwanda, Swaziland, Tanzania and Uganda.

About CMS Bureau Francis Lefebvre

CMS Bureau Francis Lefebvre is a member of CMS. Founded in 1999, CMS offers a comprehensive range of services and is one of the world's Top 10 largest firms by number of lawyers (Am Law 2012 Global 100). With 59 offices in 33 countries and employing more than 3,000 lawyers, CMS has many years of advisory experience in its local and international jurisdictions.

CMS works with numerous Fortune 500 and FT European 500 companies as well as most DAX 30 companies. It achieved turnover of €934 million in 2014. CMS offers a wide range of expertise in 19 fields, particularly: Corporate, Energy, Life Sciences/Pharmaceuticals, Technology, Media & Communications, Tax, Banking & Finance, Commercial Law, Competition, Disputes & Arbitration, Labour Law, Intellectual Property Law and Real-estate & Construction Law.


For more information, please contact:

Nicolas Merigeau, NewCap
nmerigeau@newcap.fr
+33 1 44 71 94 98
CMS Bureau Francis Lefebvre
Florence Jouffroy, Marketing and Communication Director
Laetitia Mostowski, Communication Manager
florence.jouffroy@cms-bfl.com, laetitia.mostowski@cms-bfl.com
+33 1 47 38 40 32 / 40 74

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Jean-Jacques Lecat