• Solicitor, qualified in England & Wales

·       Bantry Bay Capital  – on the British fashion retailer Superdry PLC’s part 26A restructuring plan. The plan was part of a wider restructuring of the retailer which included the delisting from the London Stock Exchange.

·       junior secured creditor - in relation to the €1.2 billion restructuring of Project Fürst, a landmark construction project in Germany. This multi-jurisdictional transaction involved the laws of the UK, Luxembourg, and Germany and an implementation involving a COMI shift to England and use of the part 26A restructuring plan.

·       committee of secured creditors - on the first-of-its-kind restructuring of international shipping company Vroon. The transaction won the ‘Deal of the Year - Restructuring’ category at the International Financial Law Review (IFLR) Europe Awards 2024. This was the first restructuring to be carried out using a parallel English scheme of arrangement and Dutch WHOA plan. This restructuring involved certain lenders receiving participations in a new syndicated secured facility, while other lenders had their facilities amended as well as a debt-for-equity swap and the issue of depositary receipts to the lenders owners of the STAK. The transaction involved the restructuring of 33 bilateral facility agreements and involved over 100 vessels. We were responsible for co-ordinating the restructuring across all jurisdictions, including the UK, the US, the Netherlands, Italy, Luxembourg, Singapore, Thailand and Canada; also acted for the predecessor secured creditor group in the first round Vroon restructuring which completed in 2018.

·       Delta Air Lines, Inc. – in respect of its 49% shareholding in Virgin Atlantic, on a number of rounds of restructurings of Virgin Atlantic as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic during 2020-2021. The first restructuring, which completed in September 2020 was the first time the Part 26A of the Companies Act 2006 restructuring plan had been sanctioned. This transaction won the ‘Deal of the Year - Restructuring’ category at the International Financial Law Review (IFLR) Europe Awards 2021. Further restructuring were required which involved Delta Air Lines providing new investment into Virgin Atlantic including a share of the £400 million new shareholder investment to bolster Virgin Atlantic’s balance sheet, enhance its liquidity and allow it to pay down debt.

·       GLAS - in connection with its role as security agent on the financial restructuring of The Learning Network (Van Dijk Groep), one of the largest educational materials supplier of the Netherlands. Our Amsterdam and London offices worked closely together on a Dutch share pledge enforcement involving English law governed debt and intercreditor arrangements resulting in a distressed M&A transaction through a management buy-out. This was a large cross-border restructuring.

·       High Court confirms Galapagos restructuring was valid | Restructuring Touchpoint Blog | September 18, 2023

·       What to expect in the syndicated loan market for 2024 | The Banker | January 15, 2024

·       English High court confirms validity of Galapagos SA out of court restructuring | International Restructuring Newswire | Q1 2024.

·       Law Society of England & Wales.

·       Gemma is a member of International Women’s Insolvency and Restructuring Confederation (IWIRC), INSOL, the Insolvency Lawyers' Association and an associate member of R3, the Association of Business Recovery Professionals.