Benjamin S. Sieck

Seadrill Ltd. – Assisted in the representation of Dolphin Drilling in connection with the bankruptcy case of Seadrill, the owner and operator oil drillships, semisubmersible rigs, and jack-up rigs. Seadrill filed for bankruptcy relief in February 2021 with approximately $5.6 billion in financial debt, and Dolphin, an offshore oil well driller that operates primarily in the North Sea, sought to acquire certain assets of Seadrill in bankruptcy. As part of that effort, Dolphin joined a consortium with two other parties to bid on all of Seadrill’s assets.

Noble Corp. plc– Assisted in the representation of a bondholder group with more than $695 million of bond debt in negotiations with Noble Corp. plc to restructure its balance sheet. Noble, a leading owner and operator in the offshore drilling industry, filed for bankruptcy on July 31, 2020, in the Southern District of Texas with roughly $4 billion of financial debt, including approximately $3.5 billion in bond debt and an approximately $545 million drawn revolver. The bondholder group negotiated and agreed with Noble prior to the bankruptcy filing on a Restructuring Support Agreement providing for the conversion of all Noble’s debt to equity pursuant to a Chapter 11 plan of reorganization, in a deal supported by all of Noble’s key creditor constituencies. The Restructuring Support Agreement also contemplated a rights offering for the issuance of $200 million of new second lien notes upon Noble’s emergence from bankruptcy, a portion of which was backstopped by the bondholder group.

Bluestem – Assisted in the representation of Bluestem Group Inc. (BGI), the non-debtor parent company and largest unsecured creditor of Bluestem Brands Inc. (BBI) in connection with BBI’s bankruptcy filing in the District of Delaware on March 9, 2020. BBI was an online and catalog retailer with more than $1.7 billion in sales in 2019. BBI’s restructuring was accomplished through a global settlement among BBI, BGI and other key constituencies, which resulted in the successful sale of substantially all of the debtors’ assets to BBI’s pre-petition secured lenders pursuant to a plan of reorganization that became effective on Aug. 28, 2020.