American International Group Inc. used a slew of advisers in the recent divestitures of two of its businesses. Citigroup Inc.'s David Head and Felix Scherzer advised AIG on the sale of American Life Insurance Co. to MetLife Inc. for $15.5 billion. Head and Scherzer, along with colleagues Kevin McLoughlin, Chetan Singh, Rafael Carrillo, Don Lacey Jr., Tyler Dickson and John Chirico, also helped AIG sell AIA Group Ltd., its Asian life insurance unit, to Prudential plc for $35.5 billion.

AIG was also advised in both deals by Christopher Cole and Andrea Vittorelli of Goldman, Sachs & Co., which worked with the company on its 2001 purchase of American General Corp. Blackstone Group LP's Thomas Stoddard pitched in on the American Life sale; Blackstone has been working with AIG on its divestiture strategy since the government bailed out the New York-based insurer in September 2008.

On the legal side for AIG, John Vasily (pictured) of Debevoise & Plimpton LLP took the lead on the AIA sale, a role that Robert DeLaMater and Stephen Kotran of Sullivan & Cromwell LLP played on American Life. Michael Aiello of Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP worked on both deals. The AIG board used Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP's Richard Beattie, James Gamble and Gary Horowitz on both AIA and American Life, while the Federal Reserve Bank of New York turned to a team led by John Knight of Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP, the Fed's usual counsel on AIG.

London's Prudential tapped a team led by William Underhill, Nilufer von Bismarck, Roland Turnill and Robert Chaplin of Slaughter and May. The law firm helped advise AIG on the American General deal in 2001 but has since developed a relationship with Pru, which also used Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP's Sung Kang, Victor Lewkow and Sebastian Sperber. Lewkow represented Pru on a bid for American General.

For banking advice, Pru turned to Sebastian Grigg, George Maddison and Charles Donald of Credit Suisse Group, with HSBC plc and J.P. Morgan Cazenove Ltd. providing financing and getting league table credit.

MetLife used John Schwolsky and Alexander Dye of Dewey & LeBoeuf LLP, which represented the insurer on its 2005 purchase of Travelers Life & Annuity Co. from Citigroup. For banking advice MetLife tapped David Platter, Adam Hodes and Nandini Mongia of Credit Suisse; Jacques Brand, Peter Babej and Steve Fromm of Deutsche Bank AG; and Barclays Capital, Bank of America Merrill Lynch and HSBC plc.