Akin Gump Advises CenterPoint Energy as Sale of Natural Gas Retail Business Closes

(Houston) – CenterPoint Energy, Inc. and Energy Capital Partners, LLC, (ECP), a private equity and credit investor specializing in energy infrastructure projects, have announced that they have closed on the sale of CenterPoint Energy Services, Inc. (CES) to an affiliate of ECP. A team from Akin Gump advised CenterPoint Energy in the transaction, from which the net proceeds will be used to repay a portion of outstanding CenterPoint Energy debt. (Click here to learn more.)

The Akin Gump M&A team advising CenterPoint included partner Rob Shearer, counsel Mary Lovely and associate Lisa Garrett. They were joined by partner Frederick Lee and counsel Charles Hely for finance aspects of the transaction, and partner Gabriel Procaccini and associate Hayden Harms for midstream work.

Other team members included:

• Senior counsel Vera Neinast on regulatory matters.
• Partner Mike Warnecke and senior counsel Stacy Kobrick on antitrust.
• Senior counsel Richard Frank and practice attorney Stuart Graves on real estate.
• Partners Bob Lian and Brian Patterson and counsel Courtney Stahl on labor and employment.
• Partner Jocelyn Tau and associate Michael Farrell on tax.
• Partner Rolf Zaiss and counsel Madeline Lewis on employee benefits and executive compensation.
• Partner David Quigley and senior counsel Andrew Oelz on environment and natural resources issues.
• Senior counsel David Lee on intellectual property.

Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP is a leading international law firm with more than 1,000 lawyers and advisors in offices throughout the United States, Europe, Asia and the Middle East. Founded in 1945, the firm is proudly celebrating its 75th anniversary in 2020. #AkinGump75

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