My areas of practice include private mergers and acquisitions and divestments, capital transactions involving complex asset and holding structures, joint venture and shareholder arrangements across industries, with a particular focus on the renewable energy, real estate and international market sectors. I am strategic and commercial in my focus and skilled at leading and coordinating large transaction teams on complex matters to bring the best of MinterEllison to each transaction.

My work in the renewables and real estate sectors has involved advising on capital transactions in broad cross section of asset classes across multiple jurisdictions, from acting on the acquisition and divestment of greenfield renewable development projects transactions to some of the largest real estate transactions in the Australian market, including two of the largest hotel portfolio transactions undertaken in Australiaand the Port of Melbourne privatisation. I have experience across the diverse sectors of the real estate and renewables industries, including development, aged care, hospitality and gaming.

Career highlights

Renewables

• Advised Vestas in relation to various acquisition and divestment transactions involving greenfield wind farm development sites, including the Winterbourne Wind Farm project in the NSW New England REZ, and with counterparties such as Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, Epuron (now Ark Energy) and Energy Estate.
• Advised PV solar developer, Enerparc, as part of a cross border team on its divestment of 'ready to build' solar development projects in New South Wales (including the Peak Hill, Trundle and Tilbuster projects) to IKEA owned Ingka Investments.
• Advised Marble Solar and Stanwell Corporation in relation to the divestment and acquisition of solar and wind projects, including as bidder in competitive sales process, transaction structuring and ongoing development services.
• Acted for a bidder on its bid as part of the competitive sale process by Edify Energy for the Koorangie battery in Victoria.
• Leads the national multidisciplinary MinterEllison team advising in respect of the ongoing development of various greenfield wind and P2X developments across a number of Australian jurisdictions, including New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia.

Real Estate

Salter Brothers Asset Management: Co-lead of the transaction team advising in relation to a range of acquisitions, including:

• 2021 - the Salter Brothers Hospitality Real Estate Fund acquisition of the $620m Travelodge hotel property portfolio comprising 11 hotels across multiple jurisdictions (including the Travelodge Martin Place, Wynyard, Wentworth Avenue in Sydney and Southbank in Melbourne) from a property trust joint venture structure of Mirvac and NRMA. This fund is backed by Salter Brothers, GIC and Partners Group;
• 2015 – the Salter Brothers Hotel Group acquisition of the ~$500m Eureka hotel property portfolio comprising 7 hotels across multiple jurisdictions (including the Intercontinental Melbourne, Crowne Plaza Melbourne, Crowne Plaza Coogee, Crowne Plaza Canberra and Holiday Inn Potts Point) from Eureka Funds Management and subsequent hotel fund acquisitions including Hyatt Brisbane and Voco Gold Coast.
• CapitaLand: Advised on a capital transaction involving the divestment of commercial logistics assets by Ascendas REIT.

Victorian Government

• Led the transaction team on the multi-billion dollar privatisation of the Port of Melbourne, Australia's largest container port.

International

• Advised a number of international clients in relation to their Australian investments, including Purplebricks real estate exit from the Australian market, the acquisition by Ariston Thermo of the Chromagen solar hot water system business, the sale of Komatsu's US and Australian conveyor business to Sellex Capital, the sale of Outokumpu's coil services business to Midway Metals, the acquisition by chemical distributor Brenntag of Ravenswood Australia and New Zealand, and other transactions for international businesses Caldic, Fiserv, Polaris, Franke and Epiroc / Atlas Copco.

I am MinterEllison's client relationship partner for Australian Unity.

I also manage a number of MinterEllison's pro bono relationships, including Ovarian Cancer Australia and Smiling Mind.

Education
LLB (HONS) (LA TROBE UNIVERSITY, 2006); BMS (LA TROBE UNIVERSITY, 2006)

• MinterEllison 2023 report finds investor confidence in renewable assets
  

  Investors to increase holdings in Australian renewable assets with NSW most attractive location.

  
  
• Point of View: Andrea Frank on renewable energy investment
  

  Andrea Frank a M&A specialist acting for private and public clients, predominantly focussing on M&A and capital transactions in the renewables, real estate, hospitality and private wealth sectors across international market sectors.

• Australian renewables investment breaking records as optimism surges
  

  Confidence in the Australian renewable energy story has never been higher. Developed in collaboration with Mergermarket, we canvassed the opinions of 100 active domestic and international renewable energy investors to gauge their views on the investment opportunities, trends and challenges in Australia.