On November 5, 2015, Hydro One Limited, the largest electricity transmission and distribution company in Ontario, announced the closing of its initial public offering by way of secondary sale pursuant to which the Province of Ontario offered 81,100,000 common shares at $20.50 per share for total gross proceeds to the Province of approximately $1.66 billion. This was the biggest Canadian IPO in the last 15 years.
Pursuant to an underwriting agreement dated October 29, 2015, the Province of Ontario also granted to the underwriters an over-allotment option to purchase up to 8,150,000 additional common shares at the offering price. The sale of the additional common shares was completed on November 12, 2015, and increased the gross proceeds from the initial public offering by an additional $167 million, resulting in total gross proceeds to the Province of $1.83 billion.
Hydro One delivers electricity to over 1.3 million customers across the province of Ontario, and to large industrial customers and municipal utilities. Hydro One owns and operates Ontario’s approximately 29,000 km high-voltage transmission network and an approximately 123,000 circuit km primary low-voltage distribution network.
The common shares of Hydro One are listed on the TSX under the symbol “H.”
Hydro One was represented by Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt LLP with a team that included Steven Smith, Michael Innes, Desmond Lee, Brian Gray, Amelia Miao, Lauren Lefcoe and Rebecca Wainstein (corporate), Andrew MacDougall, John Valley and Justin Dharamdial (corporate governance), Patrick Marley and Amanda Heale (tax), Heather McKean, Danna Donald and Joshua Lam (banking and financial services) and Richard Wong (energy and infrastructure). McCarthy Tétrault LLP represented Hydro One on labour and employment matters with a team that consisted of Paul Boniferro, Ben Ratelband and Melissa Kennedy.
The Province of Ontario was represented in-house by the Ministry of the Attorney General (MAG) Civil Law Division and by Torys LLP with a team that included Sharon Geraghty, Glen Johnson, Aaron Emes, Konata Lake, Leah Frank, Miranda Callaghan, Addie Buhr, Jordan Fenton, Henry Ren, Min Kim and Brian Unger (corporate/securities), Andy Beck (US securities), Charles Keizer and Jonathan Myers (energy regulatory), Jerald Wortsman (tax), Richard Balfour (governance), Bill Estey (research), Amanda Balasubramanian and Nina Mansoori (lending), David Steele (trust), Don Roger and Sarah Crowe (real estate).
The underwriters were represented in Canada by Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP with a team that included Brendan Reay, Michael Gans, Richard Turner, Tim Phillips, Alison Desipio, Joe Zed and Georgia Brown (securities), and Kathleen Penny and Chris Van Loan (tax); and in the US by Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP with a team led by Riccardo Leofanti that included Colin Brown.