Current practice

James Crowe is a partner in the Corporate group of Freehills in Melbourne.  James’ practice is focused on domestic and international mergers and acquisitions, principally in the telecommunications and financial services fields. His practice includes: 

• acquisitions and disposals, strategic investments and sell downs 
• shareholder arrangements, joint ventures and strategic alliances
• network acquisition, rollout and sharing arrangements
• restructures, share buy-backs and capital reductions, and
• telecommunications-related transactional work.

Industry experience

James has acted in relation to the following matters:

• acting for Singapore Power in the $8.5 billion consortium bid (with Babcock & Brown) for Alinta Limited by way of scheme of arrangement, consortium arrangements relating to the separation of the Alinta assets and the proposed on-sale of those assets to SP AusNet
• acting for Telstra in relation to the numerous acquisitions, disposals and joint ventures including the $330 million acquisition of the Kaz Group by scheme of arrangement, $231 million sale of AAS, acquisition of Damomo, acquisition of Keycorp’s TSN business and Telstra’s Adstream and Link.me joint ventures
• acting for Times Printing in relation to its disposal of its Australian printing operations to listed Australian publisher, PMP, in exchange for 11 per cent of PMP
• acting for Coles Myer in relation to its acquisition of Shell’s Autoserve business and sale of its Katies Fashions business to Millers Retail
• acting for AXA APH in relation to the sale of its Taiwanese life insurance business to AEGON NV and acting for other insurance companies in relation to proposed joint ventures and acquisitions, including by court-approved scheme under the Insurance Act
• acting for Telstra and other carriers in relation to acquisition, rollout and sharing arrangements for HFC, mobile network and submarine cable infrastructure and the acquisition and licensing of spectrum rights
• acting for Telebrás (Brazil’s national telecommunications carrier) in relation to the spin-off, privatisation and NYSE-listing of twelve subsidiaries for US$32 billion (New York), and
• acting for the controlling shareholder of Continental Airlines in relation to proposed US$20 billion cash/stock for stock merger with Delta Airlines (New York).

James is the Relationship Partner for Telstra and the Practice Area Leader for Melbourne Corporate.

Professional background

James graduated from Monash University in 1991 with a Bachelor of Laws with Honours and has a Bachelor of Science (majoring in computer science) from Monash University.

From 1997 to 2000 James practised with a leading New York law firm. James has undertaken a number of senior secondments to Telstra including as its internal M&A Counsel.

James is admitted to practice in Australia and New York.