OVH raises 267 million euros | CMS Bureau Francis Lefebvre, counsel to Société Générale CIB and Crédit Agricole CIB for (Euro PP) bond issue

The French group, specialists in cloud computing and Internet infrastructures, has announced that it has raised new funds to the tune of 267 million euros. This is the result of mixed funding, consisting of a new syndicated loan from the group’s long-standing bank pool and a private placement bond (Euro PP).

The OVH Group’s sustained development since its launch in 1999, along with its development strategy, has persuaded banks and institutional investors to back its new expansion.

The financial institutions that comprise the bank pool have committed to an RCF (Revolving Credit Facility) of 160 million euros with a maturity of 6 years. Investors in Euro PP bonds have subscribed 107 million euros for periods of 6, 7 and 8 years. This sum of 267 million replaces the 140 million euros of syndicated credit which enabled OHV to sustain investment in 2013 and 2014. It will enable the group to fund its massive international deployment.

‘Our objective is to make sure we have the resources to become a key player worldwide in cloud computing able to compete with the major American companies’, said Nicolas Boyer, OVH CFO. ‘This operation, which allows us to diversify our sources of funding and extend the average maturity of our debt, underpins our development for the next three years. It will fund an investment programme of more than 400 million euros (the remainder being self financed), while retaining the company’s current capital structure. This will allow us to step up deployment of our data centre and network infrastructures to support cloud computing for our customers and capture new markets.’

The arangers for the issuance of EuroPP bonds are Société Générale CIB and Crédit Agricole CIB, advised by CMS Francis Lefebvre: Marc-Etienne Sébire, Myriam Issad in Capital Markets and Benjamin Guilleminot in Financing.

The arrangers for the Syndicated Loan are BNP Paribas, Crédit Agricole (Crédit Agricole CIB and Caisse Régionale du Crédit Agricole Mutuel Nord de France), HSBC and Société Générale (MCIB), advised by De Pardieu Brocas Maffei (Christophe Gaillard, Sébastien Boullier de Branche).

OVH has been advised by KPMG Corporate Finance (Mark Wyatt, Guillaume Cauchoix, Daniel Jautzy) and VI Advisory (Paul O'Mahony), Nabarro & Hinge (legal advice).

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