Thaphanut Vimolkej

Thaphanut focuses his practice on energy and infrastructure projects, renewable resources, M&A and commercial transactions. Thaphanut is an associate in the energy and infrastructure, project finance team in the Bangkok office. He advises both private and SET-listed clients on corporate, capital markets, tax, permitting and regulatory matters for project development, financing, merger and acquisition, foreign direct investment and general commercial transactions. Those transactions involve real estate, energy, infrastructure, utility assets, and manufacturing and consumer credit businesses in Thailand. He also advises clients on corporate structuring and general corporate matters.

Energy and Infrastructure-Related Transactions:

• Project Development: Represented both Thai and foreign developers and sponsors on the acquisition, development, installation and financing of, and investments and joint venture arrangements in, off-grid private solar rooftop projects installed on industrial, storage and commercial buildings throughout Thailand. These arrangements include the creation of standardized private offtake agreements, permitting plans and leasehold arrangements.
• Mergers and Acquisitions: Represented Constant Energy Management Services Limited, a private renewable energy developer with assets in emerging markets, on its US-style leveraged financing and management buy-out of equity interests in operating ground-mount solar photovoltaic projects in Thailand totalling 17.5 MW, as well as a team of experienced managers and operators and a pipeline of additional projects under development, from the Sonnedix Group, a European private solar power developer.
• Mergers and Acquisitions: Represented a leading Japanese trading company on its potential acquisition of equity interest in a Thai Stock Exchange-listed and major natural resources company, and on further natural resources project development in Thailand.
• Project Development and Mergers and Acquisitions: Represented Spectrum Power Company Limited, an investment vehicle for foreign and Thai private equity investors, in joint venture arrangements with B. Grimm Solar Power Rooftop Company Limited to develop portfolios of off-grid private-to-private rooftop solar PV projects in Thailand.
• Mergers and Acquisitions: Represented SET-listed and the country’s first independent power producer, Electricity Generating Public Co., Ltd. (EGCO), on the KRW 847.7 billion (about US$800 million) cross-border acquisition of a 49 percent equity interest in the 1.8 GW Paju LNG-Fired Power Facility in Paju City, Gyeonggi Province, South Korea, from SK E&S Co., Ltd. SK E&S is the energy investment arm of SK Holdings Co., Ltd., which is the Korea Stock Exchange-listed holding company of SK Group, one of the largest conglomerates (chaebol) in Korea.
• Mergers and Acquisitions: Represented BPIN Investment Co., Ltd., a subsidiary of Thai Stock Exchange-listed and the country’s largest coal mining and natural resources company, Banpu pcl., on its 44.84 percent equity investment in New Resources Technology Pte. Ltd. (NRT) worth SG$45.10 million (about US$33.20 million). NRT is a Singapore holding company that specializes in researching, designing, manufacturing and integrating lithium-ion batteries for the automotive industry and energy storage systems and owns an operating battery-manufacturing factory in China with a capacity of 80 MWh and future expansion plans for ASEAN, China, Japan, India and Europe.

• Mergers and Acquisitions: Represented Banpu Infinergy Co., Ltd., a subsidiary of Banpu pcl. which provides one-stop service on total solar energy solutions using advanced technology, on its approximately US$55.7 million investment in convertible preference shares in the Sunseap Group, the largest clean-energy solutions provider of roof-top solar projects in Singapore with a pipeline of solar ground-mount and roof-top projects and energy storage initiatives underway in Australia, Cambodia, India, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam to reach 300 MW of overall operating capacity.
• Mergers and Acquisitions: Represented Thai Stock Exchange-listed Energy Absolute plc in its approximately US$21.6 million capital market investment in 35.19 percent equity interest in Amita Technologies Inc., a leading Taiwan manufacturer of lithium-ion polymer batteries listed on the Emerging Stock Market of the Taipei Stock Exchange.
• Project Development and Financing: Represented a syndicated lending group consisting of the Asian Development Bank and a major Thai commercial bank on the approximately US$160 million project financing of a 90 MW contracted capacity wind farm power generating facility in northeast Thailand. The ADB commitment is for approximately US$55 million in a local currency loan and for up to US$30 million from the ADB-administered Clean Technology Fund

M&A, Joint Venture and Corporate Transactions:

• Real Estate, Joint Venture: Represented Raimon Land Public Company Limited (SET: RML) on its joint venture arrangement with MEA Commercial Holdings Pte. Ltd. (MEA), a Southeast Asia-based investment arm of Mitsubishi Estate Co., Ltd., one of the largest real-estate developers in Japan. The joint venture is to develop RML’s Grade-A office building in downtown Bangkok: One City Centre. The One City Centre Project is the first-ever office building project of RML and the first real-estate investment portfolio in Thailand of MEA.
• Real Estate, Joint Venture: Represented Raimon Land Public Company Limited, a renowned Thai stock exchange-listed real estate developer (SET: RML), on its land acquisitions and joint venture arrangements with Tokyo Tatemono Group (through Tokyo Tatemono Asia Pte. Ltd.). The joint venture is to develop RML’s high-end residential condominium projects in Bangkok: The Estelle (Sukhumvit 26) and Tait 12 (Sathorn 12).
• Project Development and Financing: Represented a major Thai energy firm for the financing of 25 MW solar photovoltaic rooftop projects in Thailand.
• Real Estate, Mezzanine Financing and Mergers and Acquisitions: Represented real estate investor on their preference share investment in, and senior loan financing to, subsidiaries of Thai Stock Exchange-listed PACE Development Corporation plc. The proceeds of this transaction, totalling approximately THB 8.4 billion, were applied towards construction and financing costs to complete the iconic MahaNakhon mixed-use condominium, hotel and retail skyscraper project in downtown Bangkok, and subsequent representation on the investor’s deadlock resolution and eventual divestment from the project.
• Mergers and Acquisitions: Represented London Stock Exchange-listed, Mondi AG, on its buy-out from Thai partners in a company operating a plastics packaging manufacturing facility in central Thailand in 2017, and subsequent representation on its foreign-funded business expansion in the suburb of Bangkok.
• Mergers and Acquisitions: Represented a US-based packaging company, specialized in the manufacturing and packaging of products for food, beverage, pharmaceutical and agricultural industries worldwide, on its potential divestment of a package manufacturing plant and related business and assets in Suzhou Province, China.
• Mergers and Acquisitions: Represented a real estate investor on their acquisition of CAS Capital (Thailand) Limited and its related asset management companies which hold and manage distressed and real estate assets in Thailand. This transaction was the first investment of the investor in the country.

• Notarial Services Attorney, Lawyers Council of Thailand
• Extraordinary Member, Thai Bar Association
• Lawyer’s License, Lawyers Council of Thailand