Transforming McLaren Group's Strategy

Ashurst have worked with the team at McLaren Automotive since 2013 and over the past three years, with the appointment of Ashurst as Official Legal Services Partner to the McLaren Group in 2019, the relationship has extended across the entire Group.

During this period, McLaren has undertaken a series of major transactions - enabling the Group to secure a sustainable capital structure, and allowing it to focus on growing its business in supercar manufacturing, elite motorsport and to grow as a leading luxury supercar brand, with Automotive as the core profit driver. Ashurst has supported McLaren throughout this journey – delivering optimum client service and market-leading expertise.

Ashurst’s Strategic Approach

An Ashurst core team, led by relationship partners, Rob Aird and Karen Davies, with key support from fellow partners, Anna-Marie Slot and Tim Rennie, has guided McLaren throughout this strategically transformative period for the Group. Working seamlessly with the Group's executive team, led by Chairman Paul Walsh, and alongside McLaren's other advisers, this multi-disciplinary team of experts brought to bear Ashurst's market-leading expertise in M&A, private equity, financing, capital markets, to accelerate McLaren Group's strategic ambitions.

1. In December 2020, a consortium of investors, led by MSP Sports Capital, completed the initial tranche of an aggregate, £210 million investment in McLaren Racing. McLaren Group will remain the majority shareholder in McLaren Racing with MSP Sports Capital and the other third parties acquiring a significant minority shareholding of up to 36%
2. The £170 million sale and leaseback of its iconic headquarters, the McLaren Campus, which includes the McLaren Technology Centre (MTC) and McLaren Production where its supercars are hand built. This took place in April 2021.
3. In August 2021, Ashurst advised on the sale of the McLaren Applied Limited business to Greybull Capital. The divestment of Applied further enhances and aligns with McLaren Group's strategic focus on supercar manufacturing and elite motorsport and builds on the Group's recent equity raise and launch of the comprehensive debt refinancing, as well as the successful introduction of minority investment into McLaren Racing. This transaction completed at the end of August 2021.
4. Comprehensive refinancing including a £550 million equity investment in McLaren Group Limited, new high yield bond issuance, and refinancing of its existing revolving credit facilities which cumulatively strengthen the company's capital structure to support its long term growth plans.
5. In parallel with these transactions, an Ashurst team, led by partners Chris Bates and Rob Aird, also advised McLaren Group in relation to McLaren's involvement in VentilatorChallengeUK Consortium, a consortium of significant UK industrial, technology and engineering businesses from across the aerospace, automotive and medical sectors, who came together to produce medical ventilators for the UK during the Covid pandemic.
6. In May 2022, Ashurst advised McLaren Racing on its acquisition of Mercedes-Benz Formula E Team from Mercedes-Benz Holdings UK Limited and marking McLaren's entrance to Formula E.