Positioning for post-COVID future – Update on Restructuring Plan

Background

As announced on 26 November 2020, gategroup Holding AG (“gategroup”, the “Company” and together with its subsidiaries, the “Group”), the Group, its shareholders, RRJ Capital and Temasek (the "Shareholders") and all of the Group’s bank lenders under the senior facilities agreement dated 30 November 2018 (the "Senior Lenders" and the "SFA", respectively) have agreed to the key terms and conditions of a recapitalisation of the Company and amendment of the terms of the Group’s financial indebtedness (the “Transaction”) to position the Group for a post-COVID future.  In order to provide the Group with liquidity to implement the Transaction, a CHF 200 million senior secured interim liquidity facility (the "Interim Facility") was entered into with affiliates of the Shareholders on 25 November 2020.  The Interim Facility matures in May 2021.

On 11 December 2020, the Company and gategroup Finance (Luxembourg) S.A., as issuer of the CHF 350,000,000 3% bonds due 2022 (the "Bonds"), announced that, in order to implement certain aspects of the Transaction, gategroup Guarantee Limited (the "Plan Company"), a wholly owned subsidiary of the Company, would propose a restructuring plan under Part 26A of the United Kingdom’s Companies Act 2006 (the "Plan") for the purposes of amending certain terms of the Bonds and the SFA.  On the same day, the Plan Company issued a practice statement letter to holders of the Bonds (the "Bondholders") and the Senior Lenders (together with the Bondholders, the "Plan Creditors") setting out information on the Transaction including details of the process for implementation of the Plan.  That process involved a hearing before the High Court of England and Wales (the "Court") for the purposes of seeking permission to convene a meeting of the Plan Creditors (the "Plan Meeting") for the purposes of voting on and, if thought fit, approving the Plan (the "Convening Hearing").

Update on Timetable

The Convening Hearing was, as previously announced, held on 3 and 4 February 2021. The Court will issue its judgment on whether or not to grant the order to convene the Plan Meeting in due course.

If the Court grants permission to convene the Plan Meeting, the Group will provide a further update with a revised timetable of key dates, including the date and time of the Plan Meeting, as well as the date on which the Plan Company expects to circulate meeting materials (including the explanatory statement) to Plan Creditors.

Forward-Looking Statements    
This publication contains forward-looking statements and other statements that are not historical facts. The words “believe”, “anticipate”, “plan”, “expect”, “project”, “estimate”, “predict”, “intend”, “target”, “assume”, “may”, “will” “could” and similar expression are intended to identify such forward-looking statements. Such statements are made on the basis of assumptions and expectations that we believe to be reasonable as of the date of this publication but may prove to be erroneous and are subject to a variety of significant uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed in forward looking statements. Among these factors are changes in overall economic conditions, changes in demand for our products, changes in the demand for, or price of, oil, risk of terrorism, war, geopolitical or other exogenous shocks to the airline sector, risks of increased competition, manufacturing and product development risks, loss of key customers, changes in government regulations, foreign and domestic political and legislative risks, risks associated with foreign operations and foreign currency exchange rates and controls, strikes, embargoes, weather-related risks and other risks and uncertainties. We therefore caution investors and prospective investors against relying on any of these forward-looking statements. We assume no obligation to update forward-looking statements or to update the reasons for which actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in such forward-looking statements, except as required by law.