Two law firms with deep Texas roots were involved in Genesis Park’s sale of award-winning magazine Texas Monthly to billionaire Houston heiress Randa Duncan Williams for an undislosed sum.
Locke Lord represented Williams with a team led by partner Joe Perillo. Williams is non-executive chairman of oil and gas pipeline giant Enterprise Products Partners, which her deceased father Dan Duncan founded in 1968.
The buying entity, Texas Monthly LLC, is an affiliate of Enterprise Products Co., which Williams leads. It owns commercial real estate and ranching ventures as well as a big interest in Enterprise Products Partners.
Baker Botts partner David Peterman assisted Genesis, a private equity firm led by Paul Hobby, whose father was lieutenant governor of Texas and whose grandfather was governor.
Baker Botts’ Peterman previously advised Genesis Park on its $25 million purchase of the magazine in 2016 when he was at Norton Rose Fulbright.
Peterman’s team on the deal included associates Katie Belleville and Gita Pathak as well as partners Robert Phillpott on tax, Rob Fowler on employee Benefits and Robinson Vu on intellectual property.
Goldman Sachs was Genesis’ financial advisor.
Perillo’s Locke Lord team included associates Rachel Fitzgerald and Tom Johnson.
Perillo has done some work for Enterprise before. In 2015, he and partner Terry Radney provided counsel to affiliate Enterprise Products Operating on its purchase of Pioneer Natural Resources Co.’s Eagle Ford Shale midstream business for $2.15 billion.
Last year, Perillo also represented Enterprise Products Partners on an option to sell 25% of its Pascagoula natural gas processing plant to American Midstream for an undisclosed sum.
Peterman joined Baker Botts in 2017 along with eight other lawyers from Norton Rose Fulbright. That year he represented Lime Rock-backed GEODynamics on its sale to Oil States International for $525 million.
Earlier this year, Peterman was part of the team that advised a unit of Murphy Oil Corp. on its acquisition of oil and properties in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico from Blackstone-backed LLOG for $1.375 billion in cash.
Williams will be Texas Monthly’s fourth owner since Mike Levy founded it in 1973. Levy sold the magazine in 1998 to Indiana-based Emmis Communications, which then shed it to Hobby in 2016.
“I have been an avid Texas Monthly reader since I was a teenager,” Williams said in a statement. “I especially enjoy the longform storytelling that has helped earn the magazine 14 National Magazine Awards — the industry’s equivalent of an Oscar — over its 46-year history.
“My family is delighted to provide the resources to support this iconic Texas institution, which is nationally recognized for its editorial flair,” she continued. “The journalistic integrity and quality for which Texas Monthly is known will remain unchanged as we build upon what Genesis Park has done over the past two years.”
Hobby called the deal an “ideal outcome” for everyone involved. “The way it played out is poetic,” he said.
The transaction is expected to close June 30.