West Fraser to Sell Two Pulp Mills in Western Canada to Atlas Holdings

On September 22, 2023, West Fraser Timber Co. Ltd. (TSX and NYSE: WFG) (“West Fraser”) announced its agreement to sell it’s Quesnel River Pulp mill in Quesnel, British Columbia and its Slave Lake Pulp mill in Slave Lake, Alberta to Atlas Holdings (“Atlas”) for US$120 Million. Upon closing, the Quesnel River and Slave Lake pulp mills will be operated by Millar Western Forest Products (“Millar Western”), a subsidiary of Atlas.  

The sale of the two mills follows on West Fraser’s transaction announced earlier this year on July 10, 2023, to sell its Hinton pulp mill to Mondi, as part of its plan to transition out of the pulp business and focus on its core solid wood business of lumber, oriented strand board (“OSB”) and panels.  

West Fraser is a diversified wood products company with more than 60 facilities in Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Europe. West Fraser’s products are used in home construction, repair and remodeling, industrial applications, papers, tissue, and box materials.  

McMillan is acting as legal advisor to West Fraser, in connection with this transaction, providing corporate and regulatory support on the simultaneous sales to achieve a successful outcome for our client. Tom Theodorakis is leading the national multidisciplinary team with support from Michael Taylor, Joanna Dawson, Sandra Knowler, Gurp Dhaliwal, Lily Le, Lyndie Charlton, Mitchell Allison, Peter Hagel, Jacob Stucken, Spencer Klug, Anna Holota, Yue Fei, Paul Boshyk, Joshua Krane and Julia Loney.  

As a national business law firm with exceptional capabilities to lead businesses through cross-border transactions and investments into Canada and within multifaceted regulatory regimes, McMillan provides real-time business solutions to our clients. Our legal teams are skilled at structuring and closing complex deals of all shapes and sizes in Canada, the US and internationally and in providing innovative transactional advice and solutions. Our understanding of business imperatives and our relationships with the regulators helps our clients stay ahead.