B&M and Slaughters in mobile joint venture

Baker & McKenzie and Slaughter and May are advising two mobile phone giants on the creation of joint venture Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications.
Hugh Stewart and Michael Hart are leading the Baker & McKenzie team advising Sony Corporation. George Goulding is heading the Slaughters team for Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson. The in-housers of both companies - Ericsson's Carl Olof Blomqvist and Nobuyuki Nishitani of Sony - are also taking on large roles.
Stewart said that the most exciting aspect of the deal is its multijurisdictional nature. It involves a Swedish and a Japanese company in an agreement governed by UK law with a global business.
The new global management will be based in London and the two companies will start to merge their operations once regulatory approval has been gained.
The completion date for the deal is 1 October.