Ye (Cecilia) Hong

Cecilia has been an active legal and business advisor with over 15 years’ experience in leading and advising various complex financing and transactional matters, in particular in the spaces of private equity, mergers & acquisitions, debt capital market and bankruptcy/restructuring, ranging in size from multimillion dollars to multibillion dollars.

Cecilia has well-rounded and versatile skill sets drawn from extensive experience in representing and advising both lenders and borrowers/PE sponsors, GPs and LPs, middle market and large cap deals, bespoke transactions with complex capital structures, growth equity and impact investing, and both distressed and non-distressed investments.

Cecilia has spent a significant amount of time in both the US and Asia. Cecilia is highly valued by clients for her ability to understand the differences of doing business in different jurisdictions. She appreciates the nuances in different cultures and anticipates the clients’ needs to provide proactive and actionable advice. Cecilia excels at leading teams across practices and jurisdictions to streamline the firm’s legal advice.

Prior to joining the Firm, Cecilia was a partner in the New York office of an international law firm. Cecilia handled the following representative matters:

Direct Lending, Acquisition Financings and Portfolio Debt Investment Transactions:

Lenders / Investors

• A Fortune 500 financial service provider in its various direct private debt placement and co-investments
• A leading business development company (BDC) in its various unitranche, term loan investments and sponsor financing transactions
• A leading sponsor finance and private debt manager in its various leveraged financing transactions
• A leading global investment manager in its various direct private debt placement and impact investing investments
• An international bank, New York branch, in its various mortgage loan investments
• A leading national bank in its various leveraged financing transactions

Borrowers / PE / Strategics

• Brookfield Infrastructure in its USD 600 million acquisition financing in connection with its USD 1.1 billion acquisition of datacenter colocation operations and assets from AT&T
• Total System Services in its USD 54 billion merger of equals with Global Payments; and Total System's USD 1.5 billion senior credit facilities, consisting of a USD 700 million term loan facility and a USD 800 million revolving credit facility
• EVO Payments in its USD 845 million senior secured credit facilities, consisting of a USD 670 million first lien credit facility and a USD 175 million second lien credit facility
• Pamplona Capital, Golden Gate Capital, EVE Partners, First Atlantic Capital, ICV Partners, MidOcean Partners and Sun Capital Partners and their respective portfolio companies for various acquisition financings, add-on direct investments and portfolio debt investments

• Notable Practitioner in Banking, Capital Markets: Debt, Capital Markets: Equity, and M&A, IFLR 1000 US, 2018
• Recognized in the M&A/Corporate and Commercial category for M&A: Middle Market transactions, Legal 500, 2016