James Cross is a Partner at Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP, where he is a member of the Firm’s Corporate Department. James concentrates on leveraged finance, with an emphasis on debt commitments and credit facilities for leveraged acquisitions. He has extensive experience representing leading financial institutions and private equity firms such as JPMorgan Chase Bank and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co.
Recent transactions in which he has been involved include representations of Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. in financing their acquisitions of Brickman Group, Gardner Denver, Capsugel, Go Daddy, Del Monte Foods and Academy Sports. He has represented private equity sponsors in many of the most significant leveraged acquisition financings, including Dollar General, First Data, HCA, SunGard Data Systems, Texas Genco, Borden and many others.
His practice includes transactions involving international financing, such as the financing of KKR’s acquisitions of Oriental Brewery, Willis Corroon Group, Canadian Yellow Pages and Shoppers Drugmart. He also represents companies in strategic transactions, such as PPL’s acquisition of E.ON U.S. and E.ON’s U.K. Central Networks utility business and Wyeth’s combination with Pfizer. He regularly represents companies of varying scale in their ongoing financing activities, including major debt refinancings, such as those recently undertaken by HCA, First Data, Patheon, Livingston International and Cooper Gay Swett & Crawford.
James has been recognized by Chambers USA: America’s Leading Lawyers for Business as a leading lawyer in Private Equity: Buyouts and Banking & Finance, with a U.S. “Band 1” ranking in the latter.
James became a Partner at Simpson Thacher in 1999. He received his B.A. from Princeton University in 1986 and his J.D. from the University of Virginia in 1990. He is admitted to practice in New York and Connecticut.
