Berl Nadler is a partner with a wide-ranging corporate and commercial practice that focuses on mergers & acquisitions, corporate governance, financings, and financial restructurings and reorganizations.
Over his many years of practice, Berl has been involved in numerous high-profile transactions. He acted as counsel to the Olympia & York group of companies throughout the 1980's and early 1990's in many major financing transactions and acquisitions. He continued on to represent the investor group that acquired the Canary Wharf development in London from the Administrator of Olympia & York in 1995. Berl also acted on behalf of Onex Corporation in connection with its acquisition of Celestica Inc. from IBM in 1996. Subsequently, he acted as lead external counsel to Celestica in its numerous world-wide acquisitions and dispositions of electronic manufacturing services businesses and its related outsourcing agreements in Canada, England, the United States, Ireland, Mexico, Italy, Brazil, Japan, China and the Philippines, among other jurisdictions.
In addition to his M&A work, Berl has acted in significant financing transactions for several debtors and creditors, including major banks, funds and major Canadian corporations such as Olympia & York, Onex and Celestica. He has also advised financial institutions, corporations and utilities on a wide variety of financial and commodities derivatives transactions.
On the financial restructuring and insolvency side, Berl has acted as counsel for debtors and creditors in many receivership, bankruptcy and CCAA proceedings. These include a number of high-profile insolvencies and reorganizations, such as Olympia & York, Tilden Car Rental Inc., Med-Chem Health Care Limited, Hyal Pharmaceutical Corporation, MaxLink Canada Inc., Mosaic Group Inc., Ivaco Inc. Hemosol Inc and CFM Corporation, among others. Berl was appointed by the senior lenders of Microcell Telecommunications Inc. as one of their nominees to its Board of Directors and Governance Committee after Microcell's emergence from its restructuring in 2003 and served in that capacity until Microcell was acquired by Rogers in 2005.
In the last number of years, Berl has represented both equity holders and public companies in addressing or responding to concerns about the governance of those entities. Most prominently, he represented the Baker Bros. Funds of New York, in a highly public and successful proxy fight which resulted in replacement of the Board of Directors of AnorMED Inc. Berl was subsequently appointed as a member of the Board and Audit Committee, and as Ombudsperson, of AnorMED, and served in those capacities until AnorMED's acquisition by Genzyme in December 2006. He most recently represented U3O8 Corp. of Toronto in its successful defence of a proxy fight aimed at replacing its Board.
Recognition2008
The Best Lawyers in Canada as a leading lawyer in Corporate Law and Mergers & Acquisitions
2008
LEXPERT American Lawyer Guide to the
Leading 500 Lawyers in Canada
2008
Canadian Legal LEXPERT Directory in the areas of Corporate Commercial and Corporate Mid Market
Martindale Hubbell's highest rating
Teaching EngagementsBerl served for a number of years as an adjunct member of the faculty at Osgoode Hall Law School in Toronto teaching upper year seminars in advanced business law and corporate governance.
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