H. Oliver Smith
Co-head of Mergers & Acquisitions, with a wide-ranging M&A and private equity practice. Named a 2024 American Lawyer “Dealmaker of the Year.”
Oliver is co-head of our Mergers & Acquisitions practice and a member of our Private Equity team. His wide-ranging practice encompasses U.S. and cross-border mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures and restructuring transactions.
Oliver regularly represents private equity firms and their portfolio companies in all aspects of their businesses.
In 2024, the American Lawyer named Oliver a “Dealmaker of the Year” for his work advising ExxonMobil on its $59.5 billion acquisition of Pioneer Natural Resources. Law360 named Oliver an “M&A MVP of the Year” in 2018 and again in 2024.
Experience
- ExxonMobil’s
- $59.5 billion acquisition of Pioneer
- $4.9 billion acquisition of Denbury
- Truist Financial’s:
- $1.95 billion sale of a minority stake in Truist Insurance and subsequent $15.5 billion sale of its remaining stake
- $2 billion acquisition of Service Finance Co.
- $1 billion sale of its equipment finance businesses
- Williams Companies’:
- $10.5 billion acquisition of the outstanding public common units of Williams Partners LP
- $1.95 billion acquisition of natural gas storage assets from Hartree
- $1.5 billion acquisition of Mountain West natural gas transmission and storage business
- $1.1 billion sale of Williams Partners LP’s Four Corners Area business
- $950 million acquisition of Trace Midstream’s Haynesville gathering and processing assets
- $485 million sale of its 50% interest in Jackalope Gas Gathering Services
- $423 million acquisition of NorTex Midstream Holdings
- acquisition of the remaining interest in Caiman Energy II JV
- TPG’s:
- $6.5 billion acquisition, together with Francisco Partners, of New Relic
- $1.1 billion acquisition of Sabre’s Hospitality Solutions business unit
- investments in Cliffwater and Creative Planning
- acquisitions of Convey Health Solutions, Centrify, Thycotic, Thomson Reuters’ Elite business and Forcepoint’s G2CI business
- IHS Markit’s:
- $44 billion merger with S&P Global
- $13 billion merger of equals between IHS and Markit
- $1.9 billion acquisition of Ipreo
- sales of its Oil Price Information Services, Jane’s and Base Chemicals businesses
- Sterling Equities and the New York Mets on the sale of the Mets to Steven A. Cohen
- Aetna’s:
- $77 billion sale to CVS Health
- terminated $37 billion acquisition of Humana
- $7.3 billion acquisition of Coventry Health Care
- acquisitions of Bswift, Prodigy Health Group, Payflex Systems, Medicity and InterGlobal Group and disposition of Missouri Care
- Uniti Group’s:
- merger with Windstream
- acquisitions of Southern Light, Hunt Telecom, PEG Bandwidth, Tower Cloud and Summit Wireless Infrastructure
- PwC’s:
- sale of Global Mobility Tax and Immigration Services
- sale of public sector government consulting practice
- formation of its Global Enterprise Tax Solutions Group from GE’s tax group
- acquisition of Booz & Company
- Services Group of America’s $1.8 billion sale of its five operating companies
- Noble Group’s dispositions of Global Oil Liquids, Noble America Gas & Power and Noble Americas Energy Solutions
Insights
News
Recognition
American Lawyer – “Dealmaker of the Year,” 2024
Law360 – “M&A MVP of the Year,” 2018 and 2024
Chambers USA – Corporate/M&A, New York
IFLR1000 – M&A, United States
Education
- with high honors
- Order of the Coif
- Articles Editor, Emory Law Journal
- with honors
Qualifications and admissions
- State of New York