International legal practice Norton Rose has advised the project company Società di Progetto Brebemi S.p.A. (“Brebemi”), concessionaire of the project for the construction and management of a new 62km toll motorway linking the Northern Italian cities of Brescia, Bergamo and Milan (the “Brebemi Motorway”) on securing €1.818 billion limited recourse facilities for the project.
The limited recourse facilities to Brebemi include:
- a €760 million loan from Italian state-owned lender Cassa Depositi e Prestiti (“CdP”);
- a €105.5 million loan from the European Investment Bank (“EIB”) guaranteed in full by SACE S.p.A. – Servizi Assicurativi del Commercio Estero (“SACE”); and
- commercial facilities provided by five banks – Intesa Sanpaolo, Centrobanca, Credito Bergamasco, UniCredit and MPS Capital Services Banca per le Imprese (the “Commercial Banks”) – for €953 million (the “Commercial Facilities”), including, inter alia, a stand-by facility of € 50 million, a VAT facility of € 200 million and a performance bond facility of € 48.5 million. The stand-by facility, the VAT facility and the performance bond facility are partially guaranteed by SACE.
The Commercial Facilities provided by the Commercial Banks are partially funded by CdP and EIB under two different loan agreements of €70 million and €600 million, respectively.
The Brebemi Motorway project is currently at about 65 percent completed. Construction is expected to be finished by the end of June 2014, in time for EXPO 2015, which will be hosted by Milan.
The shareholders of Brebemi, with Autostrade Lombarde holding a majority stake of 78.9 percent, contributed €520 million of equity to the project, in order to meet the required €2.3 billion to construct and manage the new toll motorway.
The Norton Rose team was led by Milan-based Partner and head of the Italian banking team, Arturo Sferruzza, who was assisted by: Elisabetta Negrini (Senior Associate), Marco Gelmetti (Senior Associate), Mario Rondinella (Associate), Fabrizio Tenuta for tax issues (Associate) and Marina Adessi (Trainee). Other members of the Norton Rose core team for Brebemi included: Dean Naumowicz, Partner, and Dominic Phillips, Associate, both based in London.
Arturo Sferruzza said:
“This is the first major motorway infrastructure project in Italy to be completed entirely with private self-financing and project financing. I am proud to have assisted our client Brebemi in achieving this important result after many years of hard work and to have been part of a large team of project financing specialists who worked diligently and collaboratively over many years to see it through to this successful conclusion.”
Legance advised CdP and SACE whilst Chiomenti advised EIB. Ashurst advised the Commercial Banks including on the structuring of the abovementioned financings provided by CdP and EIB to them.
Steer Davis Gleave, Leigh Fisher, TrT Transport and Territory, Protos SpA, Deloitte Financial Advisory, AON and Marsh also advised on the project.
