Paul Hastings has advised Samsung Electronics on its purchase of British chipmaker CSR’s handset connectivity and location technology for $310 million. The target was counseled by Slaughter & May and Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati.
Paul Hastings London corporate partner Garrett Hayes led the deal for Samsung, alongside Hong Kong-based partner Daniel Kim, and Tokyo and Palo Alto partner Matt Berger.
Samsung said the deal would add more capability to its platforms featuring the application processors that power the world’s most popular smartphones and tablets – Apple Inc’s iPhone, iPad, and its own Galaxy products.
“By leveraging CSR's R&D capability, Samsung will strengthen its application processor platform, and solidify its position as a leading semiconductor solutions provider,” said Stephen Woo, Samsung's president of System LSI Business, Device Solutions to Reuters.
Brian Park, semiconductor analyst at Tong Yang Securities, said that up to now Samsung's growth in the mobile sector was driven by its strength in memory chips.
“With this development, Samsung has set up a foundation to bolster its non-memory capabilities,” he said.
As well as buying CSR's technology and handset team, which numbers 310 employees, Samsung will also invest $34.4 million in a 4.9 percent stake in CSR at a price of 223 pence a share.
It will also take a worldwide royalty-free licence of CSR's intellectual property for handsets and 21 U.S. patents, which will be licensed back to CSR.
Joep van Beurden, CSR’s chief executive, said the British chipmaker will keep the existing products and revenues, and could now focus its attention on areas where it was already winning, like voice and music, and automotive.
CSR said it would return up to $285 million to shareholders following the deal, which is expected to be completed in the fourth quarter of this year.
Samsung's move comes just a month after its acquisition of Nanoradio, a Swedish WiFi chip set company.
Paul Hastings’ Kim, Berger and Garrett were also the lead partners for Samsung in this deal.
Kanishk Verghese is North Asia journalist at ALB. Follow us on Twitter: @ALB_Magazine.
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