hile more than 50 companies have expressed confidential interest in acquiring Global Crossing, their identities are no longer secret to one another, courtesy of an e-mail message from Global Crossing's lawyers.
The e-mail message was sent to the potential bidders on March 28 by an employee of Weil, Gotshal & Manges, the New York law firm that is serving as Global Crossing's counsel in bankruptcy proceedings.
Although the message included only routine information on bidding procedures for Global Crossing, it inadvertently named each of the more than 50 recipients by copying their e-mail addresses at the top of the message.
The potential bidders include some of the largest international telecommunications companies, like Verizon Communications (news/quote), the BT Group, Deutsche Telekom (news/quote), Telefónica of Spain and Teléfonos de Mexico.
Other companies included in the e-mail message are financial investors like Credit Suisse First Boston, Bank One (news/quote), the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (news/quote), the Quadrangle Group of New York and the Carlyle Group of Washington. Rounding out the list are media companies like Bertelsmann and Scottish and Southern Energy, a British utility.
All of the companies included in the message signed confidentiality agreements in the last two months with the Blackstone Group, Global Crossing's financial adviser, expressing their interest in studying a bid. The companies that signed confidentiality agreements were identified by the e-mail addresses of their representatives listed in the message. Michael Walsh, a partner and spokesman for Weil, Gotshal, declined to comment yesterday, as did a spokeswoman for Global Crossing.
Weil, Gotshal, founded in 1931 in New York, is one of the world's largest law firms, with 950 lawyers in 12 offices around the world. Global Crossing's bankruptcy, the nation's fourth largest, with $22 billion in listed assets and more than $12 billion of debt, is expected to be lucrative for Weil, Gotshal.
In just its first month of work, from Jan. 28 to Feb. 28, the firm billed Global Crossing more than $1.5 million in legal fees and related expenses like phone calls, faxes and Internet searches, people close to Global Crossing said yesterday.
The circulation of the e-mail message comes at a time when some creditors are questioning the fees charged by the lawyers, accountants and investment bankers working on Global Crossing's bankruptcy.
So far, only two companies, Hutchison Whampoa (news/quote) of Hong Kong and Singapore Technologies Telemedia, have signed a letter of intent saying they plan to bid for Global Crossing.
While only a handful of the companies mentioned in the message are also expected to submit serious offers for Global Crossing, many of the companies whose names were included were surprised by the mistake, their representatives said yesterday. Others played down their inclusion, pointing out that it did not necessarily mean they were preparing a bid.
"We sign confidentiality agreements of this sort all the time," said Peter Thonis, a spokesman for Verizon. He declined to comment further.
Global Crossing's creditors' committee has requested more information on reports in The New York Times on Monday that said Asia Global Crossing (news/quote), which is 59 percent owned by Global Crossing, had paid to settle at least two complaints that accused John Legere, who was promoted to chief executive of Global Crossing last year, of practicing sex discrimination and creating a hostile workplace while he was in charge of the Asian subsidiary.
However, the creditors' committee seems inclined to continue working with Mr. Legere regardless of the settlements, according to a person close to the situation. Edward Weisfelner, a representative of the committee, said that it would not take any action based solely on the reports about the settlements.
At least two people close to the Global Crossing board have said the board was not told about the discrimination issues when it agreed to name Mr. Legere chief executive last October.
Gary Winnick, who was then chairman of both companies, had been told about the situation earlier last year, several people close to the company said. When Mr. Winnick made inquiries, Mr. Legere told him that he had taken care of the problems, one person close to Mr. Winnick said.
Several corporate governance experts said the Global Crossing board was entitled to have been told about the complaints. As Ellen Bravo, co-founder of 9 to 5, an advocacy group for working women, put it: "Even if the chairman had satisfied himself, he should have told the board so it could make its own decision. To go to the alleged perpetrator and say, `How are things going?' and be told it is taken care of is insufficient. He should have done a thorough investigation."