BAKER & MCKENZIE OFFICES ADVISE UKRAINIAN COMPANY KERNEL ON ITS IPO ON THE WARSAW STOCK EXCHANGE
Baker & McKenzie, Kyiv/Warsaw
Thursday, 6 December 2007

KYIV/WARSAW - Baker & McKenzie announced today that it acted as Ukrainian law counsel and Polish law counsel in the recent IPO of Kernel Holding S.A., the Luxembourg holding company of the no 1 producer and marketer of bottled sunflower oil in Ukraine and a leading exporter of sunflower oil, protein meal and grain.

36% shares in Kernel Holding S.A. (post greenshoe) debuted on the Warsaw Stock Exchange, where the Company raised more than PLN400 million from the issue of the New Shares.

The Baker & McKenzie team included James Hitch, Hennadiy Voytsitskyi, Mykola Stetsenko, and Svyatoslav Sheremeta in Kyiv, and Ewa Bober and Konrad Konarski in Warsaw. The Kyiv office partner Hennadiy Voytsitskyi advised on tax law issues.

This is the second WSE listing of an agribusiness company from Ukraine, on which Baker & McKenzie has advised, in addition to the 2006 IPO of sugar producer Astarta-Kyiv.

This is also the second successfully closed IPO from Ukraine in 2007 implemented with the help of the Kyiv office's team, after Ferrexpo's debut on the London Stock Exchange earlier in June.

The initial public offering of Kernel Holding S.A. shows how the uniting of Europe can generate better business opportunities. Kernel Holding S.A. is incorporated in Luxembourg, has accessed the Polish financial markets and raised funds to be used in developing its Ukrainian agricultural business.

James Hitch, the Kyiv office's Managing Partner, said: "Baker & McKenzie's strong local knowledge has enabled us to deliver this IPO successfully. We are proud that we are playing a leading role in equity offering transactions from Ukraine, having in our Kyiv office's portfolio nearly three-fourths of all of the major IPOs done thus far from Ukraine."

Konrad Konarski, head of the capital markets practice at the Warsaw office of Baker & McKenzie, mentioned: "We were happy to share with Kernel our precedent experience gained in the Astarta IPO, in order to allow Kernel to become the second Ukrainian company to raise financing through an IPO in Poland. We hope that these two successful IPOs are good examples for other companies from Ukraine and other CEE countries to follow."

ING Securities S.A. acted as the listing agent, and ING Bank N.V. acted as the global coordinator and bookrunner.

www.bakernet.com/BakerNet/News/Press+Releases/KernelIPOWarsaw.htm