FirstService Subsidiary Purchases CMN Shares

On November 30, 2004, a subsidiary of FirstService Corp. completed its purchase of all of the shares of CMN International Inc. through a plan of arrangement under the Ontario Business Corporations Act. The purchase price of approximately US$88 million was paid to inactive shareholders of CMN in cash, and to active shareholders by a combination of cash and shares of the purchasing subsidiary, with the result that upon completion, approximately 70 per cent of the subsidiary's shares were held by FirstService and 30 per cent by senior management, brokers and employees of CMN. FirstService also provided credit facilities to CMN and its subsidiaries to refinance their existing bank debt. CMN is the largest member of the Colliers International network. Colliers International is one of the top three commercial real estate service organizations in the world, with 247 offices in 50 countries.
FirstService was represented in Canada by Fogler, Rubinoff LLP with a team that included John Temesvary, Elliott Vardin, Lori Axelrod and Michael Shapira (corporate and securities) and David Oliver (banking), and in the US by Santino Ferrante and Catherine Conneely of Ferrante & Associates.
CMN was represented by Borden Ladner Gervais LLP with a team that included Neil de Gelder, Q.C., Tim Sehmer, Barbara Smith, Kathleen Keilty, David Li and Melanie Bradley (corporate and securities), Robert Kopstein, Bruce Sinclair and Janette Pantry (tax) and Don Bird and Ken Andersen (banking) in Vancouver; and Winn Oughtred, Emma Miller and Kelly Zalec (corporate), James Douglas, David DiPaolo and Kara Beitel (litigation) and Adam Segal (securities) in Toronto.
The special committee of CMN's board was represented by David Smith and Ryan Osing of Lawson Lundell LLP.