Admitted to the Paris Bar in 2004, partner Thomas Binet is a member of the Banking & Finance practice group in Paris. He has extensive experience in structured finance, corporate finance and debt restructuring.

Thomas regularly acts as counsel to borrowers, sponsors, senior, mezzanine and unitranche arrangers for such financing activities.

He has recently worked on the following matters:

• Permira / Vacalians: advising the mandated lead arrangers (Crédit Agricole Corporate & Investment Bank, Mizuho Bank, Ltd.,Royal Bank of Canada, Société Générale Corporate & Investment Banking, the Governor and Company of the Bank of Ireland) on the EUR 420 million financing of the acquisition of AMAC group and refinancing the group's indebtedness (Dec. 2018);
• Biogroup: advising the mandated lead arrangers (Caisse du Dépôt du Québec, Five Arrows and Partners Group) on the EUR 160 million financing of the acquisition by Biogroup of BioEsterel, BioArcades and Biolabs (Dec 2018);
• Ramsay Générale de Santé: advising the mandated lead arrangers (Crédit Agricole Corporate & Investment Bank, and Société Générale) on the EUR 750 million financing of the acquisition of Capio group by Ramsay Générale de Santé (Nov. 2018);
• Motion Equity Partners / Holweg Weber: advising Motion Equity Partners on the EUR 38 million financing of the acquisition of group Holweg (June 2018).

Thomas Binet is recommended in banking and finance by international legal guide Legal 500 EMEA 2017 & 2018.

« Gide Loyrette Nouel ‘combines strong expertise and sector knowledge with strong execution skills’, has ‘a competent and business-oriented team’ and ‘always finds a solution’; the group is further noted for its office network outside France. Structured finance, project finance and acquisition finance are core areas of expertise, but the team also has experience in debt restructuring. The team advised HSBC France on structuring the refinancing of the public private partnership (PPP) related to the construction and maintenance of the French Ministry of Defence, involving project debt, Dailly debt and hedging agreements; and drew on its expertise in the real estate sector to act for BNP Paribas, Natixis and ING on the €550m refinancing of Parisian building complex Quadrans. In the acquisition finance space, it assisted Partners Group with the French aspects of the financing of the acquisition of the Cerba Group, and advised Europcar on its €1.5bn cross-border acquisition of Goldcar. Bank of Ireland, Natixis and Crédit Agricole Corporate and Investment Bank are other clients. The ‘efficient, discreet and proactive’ Kamel Ben Salah is ‘a very experienced lawyer in real estate financing’ and has ‘strong negotiation skills’. Ben Salah jointly leads the practice with Eric Cartier-Millon, Laetitia Lemercier and Rémi Tabbagh. Thomas Binet was promoted to the partnership in January 2018. »
Legal 500 EMEA 2018

« The 57-lawyer practice has a broad range of other expertise, advising lenders, corporations and sponsors on acquisition finance, asset finance and project funding. Other highlights included assisting the senior lenders with the financing of Partners Group’s buyout of Foncia, as well as acting for FNAC on financing the acquisition of Darty. Eric Cartier-Millon is a leading figure. Also recommended are counsel Thomas Binet and recently promoted partner Laetitia Lemercier. »
Legal 500 EMEA 2017