James Ben is a Managing Director and Head of Global Consumer M&A at Barclays Capital. Prior to joining Barclays Capital in September 2008, Mr. Ben was head of Lehman Brothers' Consumer Mergers & Acquisitions Group, a position he held since 2007. During the course of his career, Mr. Ben has completed over $80 billion in M&A transaction volume and has also completed multiple financings, including initial public offerings and secondary public offerings of equity, investment grade and high yield debt financings.
Notable consumer transactions on which he advised include:
- The acquisition by Hormel Foods of Unilever's Skippy Peanut Butter business ($700 million)(pending)
- The acquisition by Spectrum Brands of Stanley Black & Decker's Home and Hardware business ($1.4 billion)
- The acquisition by Louis Dreyfus of Imperial Sugar
- The merger of Burger King and Justice Holdings ($1.4 billion)
- The acquisition by Molson Coors of Starbev ($3.5 bn)
- The combination of ACCO Brands and MeadWestvaco's office products business in a reverse morris trust transaction
- The sale of Pacific Sciences Laboratories (Clarisonic) to L'Oreal
- The acquisitions by Anheuser-Busch InBev of several brewing operations in China
- The sale of Del Monte to KKR/Vestar/Centerview ($5.3 billion)
- The acquisition of Burger King by 3G Capital ($4.0 billion)
- The merger of Spectrum Brands and Russell Hobbs ($675 million)
- The sale by Anheuser-Busch InBev of its Central and Eastern European Brewing Operations ($3.0 billion)
- The acquisition of Burt's Bees by The Clorox Company ($915 million)
- The acquisition of RARE Hospitality, Inc. by Darden Restaurants ($1.4 billion)
- The sale of Playtex Products, Inc. to Energizer ($1.9 billion)
- The sale of Commonwealth Brands to Imperial Tobacco ($1.9 billion)
Prior to joining the Consumer team, Mr. Ben was a senior M&A banker with Lehman Brother's Technology M&A group and spent five years working in the firm's Menlo Park, California office. While in that role, Mr. Ben advised many leading technology companies, including Cadence Design Systems, Cisco Systems, Comverse Technology, McAfee, Nokia, Symantec and Verint.
Mr. Ben is also a lawyer and previously practiced law with Sullivan & Cromwell (New York), as a member of the firm's Mergers & Acquisitions Group.