Recent work
Hem has a broad corporate and M&A practice, principally focusing on public takeovers, domestic and international private M&A, joint ventures and equity capital markets work.
He is an expert in public M&A, having been seconded as the Secretary to the UK Takeover Panel from September 2023 to September 2025. Hem was the lead regulator on many of the most high-profile takeovers in that period, including the offers for Hargreaves Lansdown, Deliveroo and Britvic, and the competing offers for Hipgnosis and Assura. While on secondment he participated in all material case, policy and enforcement decisions taken by the Panel Executive and authored a number of practice statements and proposed changes to the Takeover Code.
Hem is also Co-head of our Sport practice and has experience advising governing bodies, clubs, investors and individuals on club, stadium and player transactions, as well as on governance, sporting regulatory and contentious matters.
Highlights include advising:
Public M&A
- BHP on its approach to Anglo American
- Capricorn Energy on its proposed combination with Tullow Oil
- Castlelake L.P. on its £5.5bn possible offer for easyJet
- Pollen Street Capital on its recommended £75mn offer, as joint offeror with DBAY, for Proactis
- Reach on its defence of an unsolicited possible offer from National World
- Rotork on its £4.1bn recommended acquisition by ABB
- Schroders on its £9.9bn recommended combination with Nuveen
- Zurich on its £8.2bn recommended acquisition of Beazley
Private M&A and joint ventures
- Bupa on the £300mn disposal of part of its care home business to HC-One
- Bupa on the disposal of part of its care home business to Advinia
- CCEP on the joint $1.8bn acquisition with Aboitiz of Coca-Cola Beverages Philippines
- CPPIB and Equinix on their joint $4bn acquisition of atNorth
- Equinix on the $320mn acquisition of MainOne
- Equinix on the $874mn disposal of eight European data centres to Digital Realty
- Markerstudy on its £1.2bn merger with the Atlanta Group
- Marshalls on its £535mn acquisition of Marley Group
- OVO Energy on the sale of its UK energy retail business to E.ON
- Xpansiv on its acquisition of OTX
Equity capital markets
- ASOS on its £247mn placing
- Aston Martin Lagonda on its initial public offering
- Guoco Group on its participation in an equity raise from Rank Group
- IWG on its £320mn placing
- Marshalls on its £187mn firm placing, placing and open offer
- Rolls-Royce on its £2bn rights issue
- Synthomer on its £276mn rights issue
- William Hill on its £224mn placing
Sport
- A prominent football CEO in respect of their appointment and equity investment in a European club
- Arsenal FC on various player transfers and player contracts
- Shahid Khan on his offer to acquire Wembley Stadium
- The Premier League on various matters arising out of the application of the Premier League rules
- Various investor groups on sporting regulatory matters, including in respect of multi-club ownership and financial fair play rules
- Various Premier League clubs on corporate, commercial and rulebook advice
- V Sports on its investment in the Portuguese club Vitória Sport Clube
Other
- Google DeepMind on various matters, including the creation of Isomorphic Labs
- Non-Standard Finance on its financial restructuring
- Synthomer on its refinancing
- Virgin Group on the restructuring of Virgin Active