56 LEXPERT MAGAZINE
|
JULY/AUGUST 2016
IN-HOUSE ADVISOR
Companies going through national security
reviews traditionally hold off on engaging
with regulators until fairly late in the
game. It's time to reconsider that strategy
BY SANDRA RUBIN
Security
CLEARANCE
IF YOU HAD to choose one in-house lawyer who has experience with deals publicly going through
Investment Canada's national security reviews, it would have to be Paul Beauregard. And in the early
days, it wasn't always a pleasant experience for Manitoba Telecom Services' (MTS) Chief Corporate
and Strategy Officer, who is responsible for legal.
On Oct. 7, 2013, for example, he was walking from one meeting to the next in downtown Toronto
talking on his cell when he heard a beep. Another call was coming in.
at call was from MTS's external counsel. It was bad news: ey had just been informed that Ot-
tawa had turned down the proposed $520-million sale of MTS's Allstream unit to Egyptian invest-
ment group Accelero Capital Holdings.
MTS acquired Allstream, created out of the AT&T restructuring, in 2004. Nearly a decade later, it
wanted to divest itself of the business and, aer conducting a sale process, it had its buyer.
Accelero was founded by Egyptian telecom magnate Naguib Sawiris, who bankrolled the launch of
Wind Mobile, a small wireless company that operates in Canada.
While the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission turned down Sawar-
is's proposal to buy the spectrum for Wind, the Harper government overturned the CRTC decision,
making it clear that foreign investment was welcome in Canada's telecommunications industry.
ere was to be no such intervention this time. Allstream carries data for 43 Canadian departments
and agencies, including the Ministry of Defence and the RCMP. Following a 136-day review under
the Investment Canada Act, all the government said was that the proposal was being denied due to
PHOTO:
SHUTTERSTOCK
