Martin Sills

Expertise

Banking and Financial Services

• Asset-Based Lending and Factoring
• Commercial Lending Transactions
• Equipment Leasing
• Intellectual Property Lending
• Real Estate Financing
• Securitization
• Syndicated Lending and Participations

Business, Commercial and Corporate Law

• Corporate Finance
• Cross-Border Transactions

Strategic Teams

• Banking and Financial Services
• Mergers and Acquisitions
• Real Estate

Professional background

Martin Sills is a partner at BCF and co-leads the Banking and Finance strategic team. Before joining BCF in 2004, he practiced in the Banking & Finance Group of a major national law firm in Canada.

Mr. Sills' practice focuses on domestic and cross-border financing transactions. He has significant experience in asset-based lending, factoring, structured and traditional bank financing, syndicated loans, securitization, automotive financing, leasing, real estate financing and inter-creditor relations.

He regularly represents chartered banks, asset-based lenders and other Canadian and foreign financial institutions as well as corporate borrowers in connection with complex financing transactions.

Mr. Sills is listed in the 2009, 2010 and 2011 editions of The Best Lawyers in Canada as one of the leading lawyers in Equipment Finance Law.

Professional affiliations

• Turnaround Management Association (TMA)
• Canadian Bar Association

Conferences

• “Drafting and Negotiation of Inter-Creditor Agreements”, Fifth Annual Insight Conference on Secured Lending, 2005.

Representative work

• Counsel to the Pan-Canadian Investors Committee for the implementation in Quebec of the restructuring plan affecting $32 billion of third party asset-backed commercial paper (ABCP).

• Counsel in Quebec to a global investment firm with respect to the $2.8 billion acquisition of a world leader in destination resorts and the related $1.7 billion debt and equity financing.

• Counsel to a restructuring fund regarding the purchase from a syndicate of lenders of all of the senior secured debt of a company under a $145,000,000 credit agreement, including a debtor-in-possession financing facility (DIP).

• Counsel to a Canadian asset-based lender with respect to a $50,000,000 credit facility in favour of a major distributor of hardware and home improvement products.

• Counsel in Quebec to a syndicate of American lenders with respect to a US$200,000,000 indenture in favour of an optic fiber manufacturer emerging from a bankruptcy procedure.

• Counsel in Quebec to a syndicate of Canadian lenders with respect to a $300,000,000 credit facility in favour of the largest wine makers in Canada.

• Counsel to a syndicate of Canadian lenders with respect to a $50,000,000 credit facility in favour of an insurance brokerage corporation.

• Counsel to a Montreal-based manufacturer of commercial equipment regarding an asset-based facility ($13,750,000), an equity investment by an institutional investor ($7,800,000), two long-term loans ($5,000,000) and a factoring facility in favour of a US subsidiary (US$7,000,000), the whole as part of a management buy-out.

• Counsel to a Montreal-based manufacturer of construction block sets for children with respect to a $65,000,000 credit facility by a syndicate of Canadian lenders, involving the granting of security in many European countries and in South America.

• Lead counsel to a corporation with respect to the acquisition and financing of an office tower building in the Montreal region in the amount of $18,000,000.

Publications

• Cas/Transactions > Kilmer Capital Partners acquires a majority interest in Atelka May 15th, 2012