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Jon Chesman
Director
Jon Chesman is a director in the Restructuring & Insolvency Practice Group based in the Leeds office.
He has a broad restructuring and insolvency practice and provides contentious and non-contentious insolvency advice to management teams, insolvency practitioners, sponsors, companies and creditors.
In particular, Jon has extensive experience in advising PE-backed groups in stressed or distressed scenarios, as well as acting for PE-houses, PE-portfolio entities and trade buyers in bolt-on acquisitions of distressed assets.
Jon was shortlisted in the Young Lawyer of the Year category of the Insider Young Professional Awards 2024 and has been ranked in Chambers UK for the last five years. Commentators say Jon “can only be described as a practitioner with brilliant legal knowledge, and yet a very personable individual. He deserves the success he achieves, and works hard for his clients”, “fantastic client handling and communication; clear and articulate — working with him has been fantastic” and “hard-working, client-focused and extremely knowledgeable — exactly what you need on deals”.
- Advised the board of Applied Graphene Materials Plc, an AIM-listed advanced-materials manufacturer, in relation to its strategic review and the subsequent solvent trade sale of its operating subsidiary.
- Provided directors’ duties advice to the board of Victoria Plum, and subsequently advised administrators from EY on the sale of the business and assets to a trade buyer.
- Acted for administrators from Interpath Advisory on the trading administration and subsequent sale of the business and assets of the Slack & Parr group, which included disposals of US and Chinese subsidiaries.
- Advised administrators from PwC on the sale of the business and assets of Smiffys, the fancy dress and party products business.
- Acted for buyers on the purchase of various businesses and assets from administrators, including a £100 million-turnover glazing manufacturer and distributor; a European underfloor heating business; a trans-Atlantic technical, thermal and acoustic insulation products manufacturer; an agri-tec business; and carving out a fleet services and rentals business from a £125 million-turnover group.
- Advised in relation to failed domestic energy suppliers, including guiding those companies through Ofgem’s “Supplier of Last Resort” process, advising the administrators of those businesses and acting for energy companies in acquiring customer and debtor ledgers, either inside or outside of an insolvency or a SOLR process.
- Advised insolvency practitioners in relation to antecedent transactions, both as to the merits and commercial viability of pursuing such claims.
- Acted on behalf of a Judicial Factor appointed over a £35 million estate to defend a claim of circa £96 million, which, if successful, would have rendered the estate insolvent. The case is now one of the key Court of Appeal authorities on the circumstances in which a claim can be struck out as an abuse of process (Clutterbuck & Anor v Cleghorn (as Judicial Factor to the Estate of Elliot Nichol) [2017] EWCA Civ 137.
- Acted for an ultra-high-net-worth individual in contesting a series of bankruptcy petitions presented in relation to debts stated to be over €100 million.
Education
- University of Leeds, 2011
- BPP Law School, 2012
Admissions
- England and Wales, 2015