27 October 2016

NXP acquired by Qualcomm - the largest transaction in history of semiconductor industry

De Brauw has advised NXP Semiconductors on its acquisition by chip supplier Qualcomm. The deal, with a value of USD 47 billion, is the biggest acquisition of a Dutch company since the acquisition of ABN AMRO in 2007 and it is the largest transaction in the history of the semiconductor industry.

It is certainly not the first deal where De Brauw has advised NXP: earlier this year, De Brauw also assisted it in the USD 2.75 billion sale of its Standard Products Business. And in 2015, De Brauw advised it on three major and strategic deals, selling its RF Power Business to Chinese investor, Jianguang Asset Management, for USD 1.8 billion; its acquisition of Athena; and its USD 40 billion merger with Freescale.

Arne Grimme, lead partner on this major takeover deal: "All these transactions have been very important to NXP and to its future. It is impressive to see how NXP has grown into the world leader in secure connectivity solutions for embedded applications since its spin-off from Philips in 2006. This acquisition by Qualcomm shows that NXP is both strategically and financially healthy and therefore future-proof in its new capacity. We are proud to have been NXP's trusted legal advisor in all these matters".

Qualcomm is a US-based semiconductor and has a market capitalisation of more than USD 100 billion, and earned over USD 25 billion in revenue in 2015. The company has 27,000 employees, more than 170 offices in more than 40 countries.

De Brauw acted as lead counsel to NXP and Arne Grimme was lead partner.

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