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Thursday 21st December 2006

Leading corporate and commercial firm SJ Berwin LLP advises Bayern LB Private Equity and Hannover Finanz on Sale of Metall Technologie Holding GmbH to European Capital. SJ Berwin LLP (Munich office) advised funds managed by Bayern LB Private Equity and Hannover Finanz on the sale of their shares in Metall Technologie Holding GmbH (MTH), Menden, a leading European manufacturer of high-end heat treatment industrial furnaces to European Capital, Paris which invests €106 million into the company. Following completion, European Capital holds approx. 83 % of the shares in MTH.
 
The SJ Berwin team was led by Munich corporate partners Thomas Pauls and Dr. Christoph Brenner assisted in particular by associates Sabine Heinrich and Dr. Frank Oschütz as well as partner Dr. Michael Kreft and Christan Schatz (both tax).
For further information on this transaction see www.bayernlb-pe.de and www.mth-group.com.

For further information please contact:

Thomas Pauls, Corporate Partner on +49 (0)89 89 0 81 0 or by emailing thomas.pauls@sjberwin.com

Aurelia Spivey, Business Development Manager on +44 (0)20 7111 2060 or by emailing aurelia.spivey@sjberwin.com

Founded in 1982, SJ Berwin is a leading City corporate and commercial law firm with more than 450 lawyers working across its offices in London, Berlin, Brussels, Frankfurt, Madrid, Milan, Munich, Paris and Turin.

With more than 200 corporate finance lawyers, the depth and breadth of expertise of our pan-European Corporate Finance Department is considerable.  We offer the complete range of corporate finance services, which extends to all aspects of domestic and cross-border M&A and buy-outs, private equity, equity capital markets, financial services and tax.

Previous shopping centre transactions on which SJ Berwin LLP have advised include the £1,170 million acquisition of the Meadowhall Centre by British Land and the £480 million joint venture between British Land and Land Securities relating to certain shopping centres in Scotland.

SJ Berwin's Real Estate Division totals 118 staff of which 22 are partners (3 of which are tax partners), and 50 assistants, encompassing the disciplines of Commercial Real Estate, Construction, Planning & Environment, Property Litigation, Real Estate Funds and Tax. The division acts for blue chip clients including British Land, Royal Bank of Scotland, the Hilton Group, Brixton plc, AXA, The Crown Estate, Marks & Spencer and Gazeley.

The firm has won a number of recent awards including “Law Firm of the Year" 2006 at the EVCA/Real Deals European Private Equity Awards for the third consecutive year,” European Law Firm of the Year" (fund formation) by subscribers to PrivateEquityOnline and Private Equity International in 2005 and 2006, "Private Equity Law Firm of the Year" 2004 and 2005  at the European Venture Capital journal awards and  "LBO Firm of the Year" 2004 at the Finance and Law Awards in Paris. The Real Estate Team is Legal Business Real Estate Team of the Year 2005. It was also named "Real Estate Team of the Year" in the Lawyer Magazine Awards 2004, following its advice on the RBS/Canary Wharf transaction the highest-value property investment transaction in the UK in 2004.

SJ Berwin LLP was named ‘UK Firm of the Year’ at the 2005 Legal Week Awards on 30th November. The awards recognised SJ Berwin’s five years of international expansion and its involvement in a series of high quality deals.

On 1 June 2005 SJ Berwin became SJ Berwin LLP, a limited liability partnership.  www.sjberwin.com.  SJ Berwin LLP or an affiliated undertaking has an office in Berlin, Frankfurt, London, Madrid, Munich and Paris.