Albemarle Corporation (NYSE: ALB), a premier specialty chemicals company headquartered in Charlotte, NC and leader in the production of lithium and lithium derivatives announced on January 3, 2017 that it has successfully completed the acquisition of the equity interest and assets of Jiangxi Jiangli New Materials Science and Technology Co., Ltd. and Sichuan Guorun New Materials Co., Ltd.  The target companies have production capacity of battery-grade lithium hydroxide and lithium carbonate in both Jiangxi and Sichuan.

Albemarle Corporation is a global specialty chemicals company with leading positions in lithium, bromine and refining catalysts, which employs approximately 4,100 people and serves customers in approximately 100 countries.  This acquisition will further solidify the leading position of Albemarle in the lithium industry.

In this transaction, acting as the legal counsel of Albemarle, AllBright team has provided a full range of highly efficient and professional legal services.  We assisted Albemarle in preparing and finalizing the letter of intent, and conducted comprehensive legal due diligence on the two target companies simultaneously.  Based on the due diligence result, we worked closely with the client’s finance and tax advisers to design the best transaction structure and restructuring plan.  We were also responsible for preparing all the complicated bilingual transaction documents and participated in all the tough negotiations.  Upon signing of the final definitive transaction documents, we assisted Albemarle in completing all the conditions precedent (including various governmental formalities) to achieve a successful closing.

This is a complex acquisition, which involves two target companies and their different types of assets located in Sichuan and Jiangxi, dozens of sellers, as well as other complex matters including corporate restructuring, asset exchange, HSE, bankruptcy and disputes resolution proceedings.  AllBright team working on this deal has been highly recognized by Albemarle for its client service excellence.

AllBright team for this transaction was led by partner David Li, with assistance from Stacey Lu, Hongyu Liu, Shirley Cao and Jianing Chen.