The Department of Justice Antitrust Division cleared the proposed combination of the businesses of Datatel and SunGard Higher Education, two providers of student information systems and related products for higher education institutions.  The Antitrust Division cleared the proposed combination following a Second Request investigation.  Affiliates of private equity firm Hellman & Friedman will acquire the SunGard Higher Education businesses from SunGard Data Systems and combine the acquired businesses under a new holding company with Datatel, an existing Hellman & Friedman portfolio company.

The Simpson Thacher antitrust team was led by Peter Thomas and included Joe Tringali, Jonathan Lin, Kathryn McCarthy, Gillian Maupin, Bill Kearney, Abram Ellis, Ketan Jhaveri, Sara Colon, Kristen Grauer, Omari Mason, Sarah Phillips, and Andrew Winerman.

Chad Skinner, Brian Steinhardt and Bill Brentani continue to lead a team of attorneys in Palo Alto and New York in quarterbacking the M&A and debt financing matters for the proposed combination, which the companies are preparing to close in the first quarter of 2012.