Post by Giulietta Pizzaballa

Yesterday, I attended the ‘Behind the Scenes of a Deal’ talk and heard from the Linklaters team that worked on the Unilever-TMICC demerger. The talk offered unique insights into how commercial lawyers can advise global corporations on separating business units while maintaining shareholder confidence. As I deepen my commercial awareness, I found this talk particularly valuable and would like to share my key takeaways: What particularly stood out to me was the discussion around entity incorporation, and how it underlined the execution risks involved in multi-jurisdictional projects. Hearing about the specifics of aligning local counsel and tax lawyers with operational planning gave me a comprehensive understanding of the project management dimension of commercial law. Moreover, learning about share consolidation highlighted how technical legal decisions can shape shareholder perception and market stability, which are important commercial considerations. I learned that this process benefits the total number of shares and price per share remain as comparable as possible pre- and post-demerger, ensuring stability for the client. It was also encouraging to learn that, by breaking this demerger down into smaller, local deals, trainees played important roles in managing work streams. The speakers noted how trainees and juniors were a point of contact for local counsel, associates, and the Unilever team. I aspire to gain high-level exposure like this in my future as a trainee solicitor, challenging myself and learning first-hand from complex deals.