Matt is a specialist corporate lawyer with considerable experience advising on domestic and multi-jurisdictional public and private mergers and acquisitions, venture capital and private equity transactions, significant joint ventures and equity capital markets.
Matt advises clients across a broad range of sectors in New Zealand and overseas, including digital infrastructure, technology platforms (block-chain, fintech, payments and SAAS), financial services, energy, consumer and healthcare.
Matt joined Harmos Horton Lusk in 2023. His international experience includes working as a senior associate in the corporate mergers and acquisitions teams at Herbert Smith Freehills and Clifford Chance in Singapore.
Recent transaction experience
Public mergers and acquisitions
- Advising NZX-listed Manawa Energy on NZX/ASX-listed Contact Energy’s $1.86 billion takeover proposal by a scheme of arrangement
- Advised KRX-listed Lunit on its A$292 million takeover of ASX-listed Volpara by scheme of arrangement
- Advised NZX-listed Rakon on its response to a proposed $400 million takeover by scheme of arrangement
Private mergers and acquisitions
- Advised UK-based Access Group on its acquisition of New Zealand based software company STAAH Holdings Limited
- Advised UK-based Access Group on its acquisition of New Zealand headquartered business Tradify
- Advised Home Credit Group B.V. and PPF Group on the sale of its consumer finance businesses in the Philippines and Indonesia for €615 million to a consortium comprising Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (led by Krungsri Bank and Adira Finance)*
- Advised Home Credit Group B.V. and PPF Group on the sale of its consumer finance businesses in Vietnam for €800 million to The Siam Commercial Bank Public Company Limited (part of Standard Chartered Bank)*
- Advised NASDAQ-listed Citigroup, Inc. on the sale and migration of its Taiwan consumer banking businesses to DBS Bank for NT$19.8 billion*
- Advised Ayala Group’s listed energy platform ACEN Corporation on its US$250 million investment in US-based energy producer BrightNight’s 1.2GW multi-technology renewable power portfolio joint venture in India*
- Advised Dentsu Inc. on the acquisition and migration of Shanghai EBP Internet Technology, a Shanghai-headquartered e-commerce solutions provider to iProspect*
- Advised Macquarie Capital on its investment in Phil-Tower Consortium Inc., an independent 4G/5G telecom tower company in the Philippines and the acquisition of a tower portfolio in Luzon*
- Advised CMA CGM on the sale of its 50% stake in Indian container freight logistics hub Ameya Logistics to PSA International in Singapore, a subsidiary of Temasek*
- Advised IAG on the sale of its 26% stake in Indian’s SBI General Insurance for A$640 million to private equity firms Premji Investments and Warburg Pincus*
* Matt advised on this transaction as an associate at a previous overseas firm.
Venture capital and fintech
- Advised Grab, Southeast Asia’s leading super app, on its successful joint venture with Singtel in Singapore to establish the Singapore digital bank, GXS Bank*
- Advised block-chain payment network operator Partior on its Series A financing and fundraising round with Standard Chartered Bank, DBS Bank, J.P. Morgan Chase and Temasek (winner of the FT Innovative Lawyers in Transforming Industries Award 2023)*
- Advised LinkAja, the Indonesian state-backed digital payment platform, on the US$100million strategic investment by Grab*
- Advised Tencent on its US$55million Series B investment (along side Block and Insight Partners) in Flip Technologies, an Indonesian fintech company*
- Advised JD.Com on its investment into Go-To, a leading consumer fintech company in Southeast Asia, as part of its US1 billion Series F funding round led by JD.Com, MUFG, Provident, Google and Tencent*
* Matt advised on this transaction as an associate at a previous overseas firm.