DLA Piper advises Avnet, Inc. on its acquisition of Dragon Innovation, Inc.

DLA Piper represented Avnet, Inc. (NYSE: AVT), a global value-added distributor of electronic components, on its acquisition of Dragon Innovation, Inc.

For the last eight years, Dragon Innovation has been reinventing the way companies manufacture IoT products at scale. Dragon Innovation, through its cloud-based platform, paired with a team of hardware manufacturing experts, manages the full manufacturing process, from strategy and planning for earlier stage products to factory selection and production oversight. 

The acquisition is expected to expand Avnet's portfolio of offerings for customers as they move from design to prototype to volume production. With the addition of Dragon Innovation to its connected ecosystem, Avnet further meets the needs for companies of all sizes head on, helping them launch new hardware products in an efficient and cost effective manner that accelerates time to market.

The Avnet legal team was led by General Counsel and Chief Legal Officer Michael J. O'Neill and Vice President for M&A Legal Pauline Ung. The DLA Piper team representing Avnet was led by partner John Wellschlager (Baltimore), and included a multi-disciplinary team from offices in the US and Asia. DLA Piper team members acting for Avnet on the deal included partners Gina Durham (San Francisco), Ute Krudewagen, Victoria Lee, Stacy Paz, Cisco Palao-Ricketts (all of Silicon Valley), Cathryn Le Regulski (Northern Virginia), Paolo Morante (New York), Stewart Wang (Shanghai) and Johnny Choi (Beijing); of counsel Carolyn Bigg (Hong Kong); associates Eric Chow, Anton Ziajka, Seojung Park, Andrew Chan, Chung Wei, Eduardo Blanco (all of Silicon Valley), Xiaoshu Wang (Shanghai) and Paula Cao (Beijing); Malaz Kamal Moustafa and Philipp Tsukanov (Silicon Valley).

DLA Piper's global technology sector lawyers work across practice areas and offices to support technology clients at every stage of growth, from startups to fast growing and mid-market businesses to mature global enterprises. Last year, according to Mergermarket's league tables for legal advisors, DLA Piper again earned the top ranking globally for overall deal volume and ranked first for technology M&A in the US. DLA Piper was highly ranked in other notable league tables for 2016, including placing in the top five of each M&A, venture capital and private equity category recognized by PitchBook – the only law firm to do so.