Ontario judge dismisses Catalyst appeal

TORONTO • Catalyst Capital Group Inc. has lost another lawsuit over its failed acquisition of the wireless carrier WIND Mobile.

Ontario Superior Court Judge Glenn Hainey Wednesday ruled that the private equity firm was trying to litigate “by instalment” the same case it lost in 2016.

Hainey tossed the Catalyst suit against rival West Face Capital Inc., VimpelCom Ltd. and nine other companies, finding that it was “an attempt to impose a new legal theory of wrongdoing on the same facts” and was thus an abuse of process.

In this action, lawyers for Catalyst were alleging that West Face and others conspired to induce VimpelCom, which was selling WIND Mobile, to breach the confidentiality and exclusivity agreements it once had with Catalyst. The company’s “amended amended amended statement of claim,” as Hainey correctly described it, alleged that the 11 companies “formed a conspiracy to prevent Catalyst from successfully acquiring WIND.”

But in its first lawsuit, Catalyst had alleged that West Face and a junior analyst named Brandon Moyse (who once worked for Catalyst and then left to work, very briefly, for West Face) had used confidential information about Catalyst strategy to win the bid for WIND.

The consortium led by West Face bought WIND for about $300 million in 2014 and about 18 months later sold it to Shaw Communications