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Rita Lowe

Partner
Co-Head of Finance

Portrait of Rita Lowe

Rita Lowe

Partner
Co-Head of Finance

Contact
CMS Cameron McKenna Nabarro Olswang LLP
Cannon Place
78 Cannon Street
London
EC4N 6AF
United Kingdom
Languages English

Rita Lowe is the Co-Head of the Finance Team.

Rita has a wide and varied practice which includes advising stakeholders (such as banks, private equity, funds and pension trustees) on general issues with respect to stressed/distressed entities, advising directors, administrators/liquidators and also purchasers of distressed businesses as well as investors in distressed businesses.

Rita has acted on a number of market leading assignments, including the administration of King & Wood Mallesons LLP, Dewey & Le Boeuf LLP and Halliwells LLP: the largest European, U.S, and UK firms (respectively) to go into an administration process.

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Relevant experience

  • Sofa.com on its restructuring and successful sale (via an accelerated M&A process) to Sports Direct.
  • Bench – advising a German investor on Bench and continuing to advise following the administration of the company.
  • Misco – advising the UK and Dutch business on a restructuring of its debt (provided by a U.S investor) and working with Hilco to restructure the business.
  • King & Wood Mallesons LLP on its restructuring (and subsequently its administration). Advising on the implications of administration of the LLP in a number of overseas jurisdictions including Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Luxembourg, South Africa, Spain, New York, Dubai, Riyadh and Belgium.
  • Gulf Keystone – advising the Board of a listed E&P oil company where the principal asset was a substantial oilfield in the Kurdistan region of Iraq.
  • DTEK Energy – lenders (and ECA lenders) on the restructuring/contingency planning options.
  • Damovo Group on the restructuring of the Damovo group (a pan European telecoms group) to restructure its financial obligations to bondholders and lenders. The advice included a COMI shift, followed by an administration and a pre-packaged sale.
  • Maersk Oil on a multi-million pound drilling contract involving Hercules Offshore Inc. (now in Chapter 11) and the Jurong Shipyard in Singapore.
  • New World Resources Plc – acting for the ECA lenders on the restructuring of NWR and ultimately the bankruptcy of the local subsidiary (owner of coal mines in Czech Republic) OKD.
  • Namco on the restructuring of a South African/Namibian diamond mining company. The restructuring was effected through a provisional liquidation in the UK - formal processes in Namibia and South Africa. The company was eventually acquired by De Beers.
  • Aero Inventory on the restructuring and subsequent administration of a supplier to the airline industry; the company having subsidiaries in 13 jurisdictions including Australia, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, Canada, China, U.A.E., Bahrain and U.S. The administration involved parallel recognition proceedings in a significant number of those jurisdictions.
  • IPIT on the options available to restructure the business of a Jersey listed Property Unit Trust with subsidiaries in 8 European jurisdictions. Following various sales the “rump” business is being wound up through a managed run down.
  • Blockbuster on a major retailer on its restructuring strategy over a long number of years, including with respect to its financing from its U.S. parent. The restructuring was ultimately effected by an administration/sale of the business.
  • Tambrook on the leading Court of Appeal case which established new law on the powers of the Court to appoint (UK) administrators to a foreign company.
  • Regulated companies - advising stakeholders in a number of listed companies which are experiencing financial distress as well as a number of corporates operating in regulated sectors. Examples include advising on Metronet, the company which ran the London underground and advising a broker (regulated by the FCA), Boston Prime, on the special administration procedure introduced in the UK following the collapse of Lehmans.
  • Southern Cross – advising the directors of the Southern Cross Group which was a high profile restructuring of the care homes which had 31,000 patients.
  • Marriott Hotels – advising the receivers of the B.V.I. holding company which owns the 47 Marriott hotels in the UK. The receivers were appointed following the company’s failure to repay almost £1.6 billion of debt
  • UJIMA housing association - advising a lender in respect of the first ever insolvency of a housing association. The case highlighted certain regulatory failings which has resulted in new legislation in the form of the Housing & Regeneration Act 2008.
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Memberships & Roles

  • Council member (and past president), Insolvency Lawyers Association
  • Member of INSOL
  • Member of the TMA
  • Member, R3 (Association of Business Recovery Professionals)
  • Named as one of The Lawyer’s Hot 100, 2014 – 15 “which recognise lawyers who have been making a difference in the legal market”
  • Committee Member of Co-operation Ireland (Legal Dinner)
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Education

  • 1987 – LLM, UCL, London
  • 1986 ‑ LLB, Queens University, Belfast
  • Rita qualified as a Barrister and was called to the Inns of Court of Northern Ireland. In 1993 she requalified as a solicitor and became a partner in 1998.
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Expertise

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21/06/2022
CMS ap­points six new prac­tice and sec­tor group heads
CMS is pleased to an­nounce new heads for four of its in­ter­na­tion­al ex­pert­ise groups.All CMS law­yers work in cross-bor­der groups across more than 40 coun­tries world­wide that are struc­tured ac­cord­ing to...
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24/04/2020
Crypto­cur­rency = prop­erty= leg­al pro­tec­tion
The UK Jur­is­dic­tion Taskforce’s Leg­al State­ment on the Status of Cryptoassets and Smart Con­tracts is prov­ing to be in­flu­en­tial both do­mest­ic­ally and in­ter­na­tion­ally for its ana­lys­is of the leg­al status...
Law-Now FinTech
12/11/2019
The TCC opens the door (slightly) for ad­ju­dic­a­tion pro­ceed­ings by com­pan­ies...
A re­cent TCC de­cision has provided fur­ther guid­ance on a li­quid­at­or’s op­tions when seek­ing pay­ments owed to in­solv­ent com­pan­ies through ad­ju­dic­a­tion and the in­ter­play with the In­solv­ency Rules. The...
Law-Now Corporate
12/04/2019
Meet­ing the Fund­ing Gap: UK Mu­ni­cip­al Bonds Agency & Pub­lic Works Loan...
Ac­cord­ing to the Loc­al Gov­ern­ment As­so­ci­ation (LGA), by 2020 loc­al au­thor­it­ies will have lost 60p in every £1 they were al­loc­ated by cent­ral gov­ern­ment a dec­ade ago. Not­with­stand­ing this re­duc­tion in...
Law-Now Consumer Products
13/11/2018
Re­struc­tur­ing in CEE: trends, tools & tech­niques (Lon­don)
2018 has been an­oth­er year of strong fig­ures for the Cent­ral and East­ern European (CEE) eco­nomy, driv­en by low un­em­ploy­ment, buoy­ant wage growth and an on-go­ing in­vest­ment boom, with Ro­mania, Po­land and...
Event Legal
08/11/2018
CMS bol­sters pro­ject and en­ergy fin­ance ex­pert­ise with key part­ner hire
CMS is de­lighted to an­nounce the ap­point­ment of Paul Simpson as a Part­ner in the firm’s Bank­ing & Fin­ance group in Lon­don. He joins the firm from Shear­man & Ster­ling LLP where he was Coun­sel in the...
News
07/11/2018
CMS tri­umphs at TRI Awards 2018
CMS has been awar­ded ‘In­solv­ency Law Firm of the Year’ at the pres­ti­gi­ous Turn­around, Re­struc­tur­ing & In­solv­ency (TRI) Awards, held on 6 Novem­ber in Lon­don. The CMS team was re­cog­nised for its leg­al...
News
03/08/2018
TCC Bars Ad­ju­dic­a­tion Pro­ceed­ings for Com­pan­ies in Li­quid­a­tion
A re­cent TCC de­cision has ruled that ad­ju­dic­a­tion pro­ceed­ings can­not be brought by com­pan­ies in li­quid­a­tion in re­la­tion to fin­an­cial claims un­der a con­struc­tion con­tract. The de­cision will have con­sid­er­able...
Law-Now Construction & Engineering
19/07/2018
Com­pany Vol­un­tary Ar­range­ments: An Over­view
Mar­tin Brown, Part­ner in our Re­struc­tur­ing & In­solv­ency Group, provides an over­view of CVAs as the pro­ced­ure that is cur­rently in vogue in the UK for cer­tain dis­tressed busi­nesses, not­ably re­tail­ers and...
Publication
19/07/2018
Com­pany Vol­un­tary Ar­range­ments: An Over­view for Lenders
Mar­tin Brown, Part­ner in our Re­struc­tur­ing & In­solv­ency Group, provides an over­view of the lender’s per­spect­ive of CVAs as the pro­ced­ure that is cur­rently in vogue in the UK for cer­tain dis­tressed busi­nesses...
Publication
10/04/2018
In­solv­ency con­sulta­tion puts gov­ernance in the spot­light
We closed the first quarter of 2018 fol­low­ing a peri­od of in­tense scru­tiny on the re­struc­tur­ing and in­solv­ency pro­fes­sion. The stress in the re­tail and din­ing sec­tors, the in­crease in CVAs and the vari­ous...
Law-Now Banking & Finance
10/01/2018
Com­pany vol­un­tary ar­range­ments: not just a "one trick pony"
On 12 Decem­ber 2017, cred­it­ors in the long run­ning spe­cial ad­min­is­tra­tion of failed stock­brok­ing firm, MF Glob­al UK Lim­ited (“MF Glob­al”), ap­proved a com­pany vol­un­tary ar­range­ment (“CVA”). This...
Law-Now Banking & Finance
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