Womble Bond Dickinson (WBD)’s early-stage company support offering, WBD Accelerate, has worked with Vero Power, a Distributed Energy Service Company (DESCO) with offices in the UK and Zambia creating profitable rural electrification projects, supporting its growth and expansion plans.
Vero Power provides affordable, reliable, and accessible electricity services to rural communities across Zambia with a unique electrification approach which reduces the amount of costly distribution networks required when compared to typical mini grids. This modular and scalable approach enables them to economically connect a wider market – from a handful of connections in one extreme to hundreds in the other.
WBD Accelerate provided important initial start-up advice to Vero Power, guiding them through initial shareholder arrangements and share structuring as well an investment from a private investor.
WBD Accelerate is a package of streamlined services which includes access to a range of legal experts experienced in advising businesses at a similar stage with a nominated legal ‘mentor’ as a first point of contact. There is also access to a growing number of commonly needed and focussed legal documents that can be produced on a self-service basis through the firm’s platforms.
Corporate tech lawyer, Oliver Rickett, commented: “We really enjoyed working with the team at Vero Power. The need for better and more sustainable energy infrastructure across the planet has never been greater, especially in the developing world, and so we were more than happy to assist with the necessary legal support to ensure everything is in place for the next stage of Vero Power’s development. WBD Accelerate was launched because we understand that there are a whole range of challenges to be met by early stage companies in growing and scaling up a successful business and that legal considerations are only part of that jigsaw. However, making sure that the ‘legals’ are right from the start tends through a platform like WBD Accelerate, which ensures quality legal advice delivered through cost-effective means, tends to pay dividends in saving time and reducing risk in the longer term.”
Created to help growing start-ups and scale-ups navigate the common issues facing fast growing companies, the objective of WBD Accelerate is to fast forward the legal foundations of the business in a user friendly way.
As part of the service, the firm can provide guidance on common themes such as the different investment options available; pitfalls around the ownership and protection of key IP rights; arrangements between shareholders; the terms on which the company does business; questions around the collection of data and how to manage employment considerations.
The cross-practice team behind WBD Accelerate has many years of experience advising on the issues facing fast growing companies and has worked with a range of clients from early stages all the way through to exit. The more established organisations which the firm works with are also increasingly collaborating with earlier stage companies, particularly around the march of digitisation and the innovation that often entails, with WBD Accelerate therefore also providing a cross-over for that experience both ways.
This has now led to WBD becoming the official legal brand partner of Yena and it will work with the network and its other partners over the course of 2020 to support and grow the community through advice, educational content and mentoring as well as sponsorship of Yena’s UK-based and international meetups.
Craig Morgan, CEO and Founder of Vero Power commented: “Oliver and the team at WBD Accelerate provided an excellent, and responsive service which has provided real added value to our business. The WBD Accelerate platform was seamless, and the document production process straight forward. By having a team of lawyers to-hand at a firm like WBD ensured that we were well-advised as we made crucial decisions that will set the foundations for the next stage of Vero Power’s growth cycle”.
Ranking in the UK’s top 20 law firms, WBD provides legal expertise in eleven key sectors from across eight offices in the UK, including London, and 18 offices in the US. The firm has a large corporate practice advising national and international clients on a broad range of corporate transactions, particularly M&A, IPOs, private equity investments as well as growth and development capital fundraisings.
About Womble Bond Dickinson
Womble Bond Dickinson is a transatlantic law firm with more than 1,000 lawyers based in 27 UK and US office locations. The firm provides core legal services including: Commercial, Corporate, Employment, Pensions, Dispute Resolution, Litigation, Finance, Banking, Restructuring, Insolvency, IP, Technology and Data, Private Wealth, Projects, Construction and Infrastructure, Real Estate and Regulatory Law.
Womble Bond Dickinson has a particular focus on eleven key sectors: Energy & Natural Resources, Financial Institutions, Healthcare, Insurance, Manufacturing, Real Estate, Retail & Consumer, Transport, Logistics & Infrastructure, Pharmaceuticals, Biotechnology & Life Sciences, Technology and Private Wealth.
The firm’s UK offices are in Aberdeen, Bristol, Edinburgh, Leeds, London, Newcastle, Plymouth and Southampton. The US offices are in Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Houston, Los Angeles, Orange County, Palo Alto, Silicon Valley – Calif, Wilmington – Del, Charlotte, Greensboro, Raleigh, Research Triangle Park, Winston-Salem – N.C., Charleston, Columbia, Greenville – S.C., Charlottesville, Tysons Corner – Va. and Washington D.C.
The firm’s reach also extends to Europe where it has strategic partnerships with other law firms in Germany and France. Through the firm’s association with Lex Mundi, the world’s largest association of independent law firms, Womble Bond Dickinson also can offer clients access to quality-tested local counsel in more than 120 countries.
About Vero Power
Vero Power is a Distributed Energy Service Company (DESCO) with offices in the UK and Zambia focused on providing affordable and clean energy to the most underserved communities globally.
The company is an enabler creating solar solutions that flex with community and customer, their locality and demand. Vero Power’s offer facilitates multifaceted dynamic change: productivity; inclusion, entrepreneurship and diversification. Working in partnership with communities and suppliers, they deliver cohesive projects to fulfil civic need and progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals.
For the communities Vero Power serves, they provide access to productive power; for their investors they provide access to a growing market with significant social benefits.
