New Chapter 11 Bankruptcy Filing - Golden Eagle Entertainment $ENT

Golden Eagle Entertainment

July 22, 2020

Suffice it to say, high correlation to the airline and cruiseline industries is a credit negative these days. A few months ago Speedcast — a provider of information technology services and (largely satellite-dependent) communications solutions (i.e., cybersecurity, content solutions, data and voice apps, IoT, network systems) to customers in the cruise, energy, government and commercial maritime businesses — discovered this the hard way and free fell into bankruptcy court. There’s still no resolution of that case. Similarly, Global Eagle Entertainment Inc. ($ENT), a business that generates revenue by (i) licensing and managing media and entertainment content and providing related services to customers in the airline, maritime and other “away-from-home” nontheatrical markets, and (ii) providing satellite-based Internet access and other connectivity solutions to airlines, cruise ships and other markets, couldn’t avoid trouble once COVID-19 shutdown its core end users. No monthly recurring revenue model can save a company when its clients are effectively closed for business AND there’s $855.6mm of funded debt to service. Not to state the obvious.

Things may get worse before they get better. The company’s largest customer is Southwest Airlines Co. ($LUV) (21% of overall revenue) and it has a pretty bearish take on …

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• Jurisdiction: D. of Delaware (Judge Dorsey)

• Capital Structure: $85mm RCF, $503.3mm TL, $188.7mm second lien notes, $82.5mm unsecured convertible notes.

• Professionals:

  • Legal: Latham & Watkins LLP (George Davis, Madeleine Parish, Ted Dillman, Helena Tseregounis, Nicholas Messana, Eric Leon) & Young Conaway Stargatt & Taylor LLP (Michael Nestor, Kara Hammond, Betsy Feldman)

  • Financial Advisor: Alvarez & Marsal LLC

  • Investment Banker: Greenhill & Co. Inc.

  • Claims Agent: Prime Clerk LLC (*click on the link above for free docket access)

• Other Parties in Interest:

  • Prepetition First Lien Admin Agent & DIP Agent: Citibank NA

    • Legal: Weil Gotshal & Manges LLP (David Griffiths, Bryan Podzius)

  • Ad Hoc DIP & First Lien Lender Group: Apollo Global Management, L.P., Eaton Vance Management, Arbour Lane Capital Management, Sound Point Capital Management, Carlyle Investment Management LLC, Mudrick Capital Management, BlackRock Financial Management, Inc.

    • Legal: Gibson Dunn & Crutcher LLP (Scott Greenberg, Michael Cohen, Jason Goldstein) & Pachulski Stang Ziehl & Jones LLP (Laura Davis Jones, TImothy Cairns)

  • Second Lien Agent: Cortland Capital Market Services LLC

  • Second Lien Noteholders: Searchlight Capital Partners LP

    • Legal: Paul Weiss Rifkind Wharton & Garrison LLP (Alan Kornberg, Michael Turkel, Irene Blumberg, Elizabeth Sacksteder) & Richards Layton & Finger PA (Daniel DeFranceschi, Zachary Shapiro)

  • Southwest Airlines Inc.

    • Legal: Vinson & Elkins LLP (William Wallander, Paul Heath, Robert Kimball, Matthew Struble) & Saul Ewing Arnstein & Lehr LLP (Lucian Murley)

  • AT&T Corp.

    • Legal: Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer LLP (Brian Lohan) & Morris Nichols Arsht & Tunnell LLP (Derek Abbott, Brett Turlington)

  • Terry Steiner International

    • Legal: Loeb & Loeb LLP (Daniel Besikof, Geneva Shi)

  • Telesat International Limited

    • Legal: Hodgson Russ LLP (Garry Graber)

  • Nantahala Capital Management LLC

    • Legal: King & Spalding LLP (Arthur Steinberg, Scott Davidson) & The Rosner Law Group LLC (Frederick Rosner, Jason Gibson)

New Chapter 11 Bankruptcy Filing -- Fusion Connect Inc.

Fusion Connect Inc.

June 3, 2019

We previously wrote about Fusion Connect Inc. ($FSNN), providers of “Unified Communications-as-a-Service” and “Infrastructure-as-a-Service” in “⛈A Dark "Cloud" on the Horizon⛈.” Therein we marveled at how special Fusion must be…to fail SO SPECTACULARLY in today’s cloud here, cloud there, cloud everywhere, everyone’s gaga for cloud environment. Cloud is SO captivating that it wasn’t until the company filed a piss poor 8-K back in April that a B. Riley FBR ($RILY) analyst FINALLY had an epiphany and declared that the company’s stock ought to be downgraded from “buy” to “neutral” (huh?!?) with a price target of $0.75 — down from $9.75/share. This is despite the fact that the stock hadn’t traded anywhere in the vicinity of $9.75/share in ages — nowhere even close, actually — but whatevs. Clearly, his head was in the cloud(s). This, ladies and gentlemen, demonstrates, in a nutshell, the utter worthlessness of equity analyst reports.🖕

But this isn’t a story about shoddy analyst research. That would be wholly unoriginal. This is a story about synergies and burdensome debt. Because, like, that’s so super original that you won’t read of it again until…well…you scroll below to the next bit of content about FTD!! 🙄

Boiled down to its simplest form, this company is the product of an acquisition strategy (and reverse merger) gone wrong. Like, in a major, major way. Per the company:

The Company pursued the Birch Merger with a vision of leveraging its existing processes and structures to create synergies between Fusion’s and Birch’s joined customer bases, combine network infrastructure assets to improve operational efficiencies, and ultimately drive material growth in Fusion’s and Birch’s combined annual revenue. In connection with the Birch Merger and MegaPath Merger, the Company incurred $680 million in secured debt. (emphasis added)

That reverse merger closed at the end of Q2, 2018. Yet…

Unfortunately, due to underperformance compared to business projections, the Company found itself with limited liquidity and at risk of default under its debt documents by early 2019.

Wait, what? Limited liquidity and risk of default by “early 2019”?!? Who the f*ck diligenced and underwrote this transaction?!? This sitch is so bad, that the company literally didn’t have enough liquidity to make a recent $6.7mm amort payment under the first lien credit agreement and a $300k interest payment on its unsecured debt. This is the company’s pre-petition capital structure:

• $20mm super senior L+10% June 2019 debt

• $43.3mm Tranche A Term Loans L+6.0% May 2022 debt

• $490.9mm Tranche B Term Loans L+8.5% May 2023 debt

• $39mm Revolving Loans L+6.0% May 2022 debt

• $85mm Second Lien L+10.5% November 2023 debt

• $13.3mm Unsecured Debt

Back in April we summed up the situation as follows:

The company’s recent SEC reports constitute a perfect storm of bad news. On April 2, the company filed a Form 8-K indicating that (i) a recently-acquired company had material accounting deficiencies that will affect its financials and, therefore, certain of the company’s prior filings “can no longer be relied upon,” (ii) it won’t be able to file its 10-K, (iii) it failed to make a $7mm interest payment on its Tranche A and Tranche B term loan borrowings due on April 1, 2019, and (iv) due to the accounting errors, the company has tripped various covenants under the first lien credit agreement — including its fixed charge coverage ratio and its total net leverage ratio.

Again, who diligenced the reverse merger?!? 😡

So here we are. In bankruptcy. To what end?

The company is seeking a dual-path restructuring that is all the rage these days: everyone loves to promote optionality that will potentially result in greater value to the estate. In the first instance, the company proposes, as a form of “stalking horse,” a “reorganization transaction” backed by a restructuring support agreement with certain of its lenders. This transaction would slash $300mm of the company’s $665mm of debt and result in the company’s first lien lenders owning the company. That is, unless a buyer emerges out of the woodwork with a compelling purchase price. To promote this possibility, the company is filing a bid procedures motion with the bankruptcy court with the hope of an eventual auction taking place. If a buyer surfaces with mucho dinero, the company will toggle over to a sale pursuant to a plan of reorganization. This would obviously be the optimal scenario. Absent that (and maybe even with that), we’ve got a jaw-dropping example of value destruction. “Fail fast,” many in tech say. These cloud bros listened!! Nothing like deep-sixing yourself with a misguided poorly-diligenced acquisition. Bravo!!

The company has secured a commitment for a fully-backstopped $59.5mm DIP that subsumes the $20mm in super senior pre-petition bridge financing recently provided by the first lien lenders. Is this DIP commitment good for general unsecured creditors? Is any of this generally good for unsecured creditors? Probably not.

Major creditors include a who’s who of telecommunications companies, including AT&T Inc. ($T) (first Donald Trump and now THIS…rough week for AT&T), Verizon Communications Inc. ($VZ), XO Communications (owned by VZ), Frontier Communications Corp. ($FTR)(which has its own issues to contend with as it sells assets to sure up its own balance sheet), CenturyLink Inc. ($CTL), Level 3 Communications ($LVLT), Time Warner Inc. ($TWX), and….wait for it…bankrupt Windstream Communications ($WINMQ). Because the hits just keep on coming for Windstream….

Jurisdiction: S.D. of New York (Judge Bernstein)

• Capital Structure: see above.

• Professionals:

  • Legal: Weil Gotshal & Manges LLP (Gary Holtzer, Sunny Singh, Natasha Hwangpo)

  • Board of Directors: Matthew Rosen, Holcombe Green Jr., Marvin Rosen, Holcombe Green III, Michael Del Guidice, Lewis Dickey Jr., Rafe de la Gueronniere, Neil Goldman)

  • Financial Advisor: FTI Consulting Inc. (Mark Katzenstein)

  • Investment Banker: PJT Partners (Brent Herlihy, John Singh)

  • Claims Agent: Prime Clerk LLC (*click on the link above for free docket access)

• Other Parties in Interest:

  • Ad Hoc First Lien Lender Group

    • Legal: Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP (Damian Schaible, Adam Shpeen)

    • Financial Advisor: Greenhill & Co. Inc.

  • DIP Lender: Credit Suisse Loan Funding LLC

  • DIP Agent, Prepetition Super Senior Agent & Prepetition First Lien Agent: Wilmington Trust NA

    • Legal: Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer (Michael Messersmith, Sarah Grylll, Alan Glantz)

  • Prepetition Second Lien Successor Agent: GLAS America LLC & GLAS USA LLC

  • Ad Hoc Group of Tranche A Term Loan/Revolving Lenders

    • Legal: Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP (Sandeep Qusba, Soogy Lee, Edward Linden)

  • Second Lien Lenders

    • Legal: Proskauer Rose LLP (Charles Dale, Jon English)

  • Large Unsecured Creditor: AT&T

    • Legal: Norton Rose Fulbright US LLP (David Rosenzweig, Francisco Vazquez)

Updated 6/4/19 at 5:42am

New Chapter 11 Bankruptcy Filing - Windstream Holdings Inc.

Windstream Holdings Inc.

February 25, 2019

See here for our write-up on Winstream Holdings Inc.

• Jurisdiction: S.D. of New York (Judge Drain)

• Capital Structure: see below.

• Professionals:

  • Legal: Kirkland & Ellis LLP (James Sprayragen, Stephen Hessler, Ross Kwasteniet, Marc Kieselstein, Brad Weiland, Cristine Pirro Schwarzman, John Luze, Neda Davanipour)

  • Legal (Board of Directors): Norton Rose Fulbright US LLP (Louis Strubeck Jr., James Copeland, Kristian Gluck)

  • Financial Advisor: Alvarez & Marsal LLC

  • Investment Banker: PJT Partners LP

  • Claims Agent: KCC (*click on the link above for free docket access)

• Other Parties in Interest:

  • DIP Lender ($500mm TL, $500mm RCF): Citigroup Global Markets Inc.

  • Prepetition 10.5% and 9% Notes Indenture Trustee: Wilmington Trust NA

    • Legal: Reed Smith LLP (Jason Angelo)

  • Prepetition TL and RCF Agent: JPMorgan Chase Bank NA

    • Legal: Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP (Sandeep Qusba, Nicholas Baker, Jamie Fell)

  • Ad Hoc Group of Second Lien Noteholders

    • Legal: Milbank LLP

    • Financial Advisor: Houlihan Lokey Capital

  • Ad Hoc Group of First Lien Term Lenders

    • Legal: Paul Weiss Rifkind Wharton & Garrison LLP (Brian Hermann, Andrew Rosenberg, Samuel Lovett, Michael Rudnick)

    • Financial Advisor: Evercore

  • Midwest Noteholders

    • Legal: Shearman & Sterling LLP

  • Uniti Group Inc.

    • Legal: Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP (Marshall Huebner, Eli Vonnegut, James Millerman)

    • Financial Advisor: Rothschild & Co.

  • Large Unsecured Creditor: AT&T Corp.

    • Legal: Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer LLP (Brian Lohan, Ginger Clements, Peta Gordon) & AT&T (James Grudus)

  • Large Unsecured Creditor: Verizon Communications Inc.

    • Legal: Stinson Leonard Street LLP (Darrell Clark, Tracey Ohm)

  • Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors (AT&T Services Inc., Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, Communication Workers of America, AFL-CIO CLC, VeloCloud Networks Inc., Crown Castle Fiber, LEC Services Inc., UMB Bank)

    • Legal: Morrison & Foerster LLP (Lorenzo Marinuzzi, Brett Miller, Todd Goren, Jennifer Marines, Erica Richards)

New Chapter 11 Filing - Goodman Networks Inc.

Goodman Networks Inc.

• 3/13/17 Recap: Frisco Texas-based minority-business-enterprise (MBE) and wireless network and satellite television systems servicer filed a prepackaged chapter 11 case to de-lever its balance sheet by $212.5mm. This is a story, in many respects, about a concentrated revenue base and too much debt. 83% of the company's revenue is attributable to AT&T and "substantial completion of AT&T's 4G network build-out has diminished the associated demand for Goodman's services." Consequently, the company wasn't generating enough revenue to sustain its capital structure. Now, holders of the secured debt will receive cash, $112.5mm of new debt, PIK preferred stock and common stock. To preserve the MBE status, current equity will get PIK preferred stock and 50.1% of the common stock. Query whether that level of retained equity is a lesson to those who invested in this MBE structure. 
• Jurisdiction: S.D. of Texas
• Capital Structure: $25mm RCF (MidCap Financial Trust), $325mm '18 12.125 % secured notes (Wells Fargo)
• Company Professionals: 
  • Legal: Kirkland & Ellis LLP (Patrick Nash, Joshua Sussberg, Joseph Graham, Laura Krucks, Alexander Cross) & (local) Haynes & Boone LLP (Stephen Pezanosky, Kelli Norfleet)
  • Financial Advisor: FTI Consulting (John Debus)
  • Investment Banker: June Creek Interests (Andy Jent)
  • Claims Agent: KCC (*click on company name for docket)
• Other Parties in Interest:
  • Ad Hoc Committee of Second Lien Bondholders (Alden Global, AllianceBernstein Global LP, J.P. Morgan Investment Management Inc., J.P Morgan Chase Bank N.A., Phoenix Investment Advisor LLC, Principal Global Investors LLC, Invesco Senior Secured Management Inc., Sound Point Capital Management LP)
    • Legal: Akin Gump (Michael Stamer, Charles Gibbs, Meredith Lahaie, Sara Brauner)
    • Financial: Greenhill & Co. Inc.
• Wells Fargo
  • Legal: Reed Smith LLP (Eric Schaffer, Lloyd Lim, Maura Nuno)
• AT&T Corp.
  • Legal: Sidley Austin LLP (Brian Lohan)

Updated 3/28/17