Sonia K. Nijjar

In addition to her transactional work advising boards of directors, special committees and senior management teams, Ms. Nijjar provides strategic counsel to both public and private companies on securities law, corporate governance, activist investor situations and other general corporate matters. Ms. Nijjar’s deep understanding of the legal landscape and her commitment to client success have made her a trusted adviser to some of the most influential companies in Silicon Valley.

Her transactions include the representation of:

• Activision Blizzard Inc. in its $75 billion acquisition by Microsoft Corporation
• Elon Musk in his $44 billion acquisition of Twitter, Inc.
• Xilinx in its $49 billion acquisition by Advanced Micro Devices
• Coherent in its initially announced $5.7 billion sale to Lumentum, followed by Coherent’s subsequent responses to competing acquisition proposals from MKS Instruments, II-VI and Lumentum in a three-party bidding war culminating in Coherent’s $7.1 billion sale to II-VI
• Visa in multiple transactions, including its $1 billion acquisition of Pismo and its proposed, but terminated, $5.3 billion acquisition of Plaid
• Intel Corporation in its:
  • agreement with Brookfield Infrastructure Partners L.P. to jointly invest approximately $30 billion to create a first-of-its-kind Semiconductor Co-Investment Program that introduces a new funding model to the semiconductor industry
  • $15.3 billion acquisition of Mobileye
  • $4.2 billion spin-off and joint venture with TPG Capital to form the independent cybersecurity company McAfee
  • sale of its Wind River subsidiary to TPG Capital
• Netflix, Inc. in its acquisitions of Scanline VFX and Animal Logic
• Livongo in its $18.5 billion acquisition by Teladoc Health
• Credit Karma in its $8.1 billion acquisition by Intuit and the $50 million divestiture of its tax business, Credit Karma Tax, to Square, Inc.
• Willis Towers Watson in the $4 billion sale of its treaty reinsurance business Willis Re to Gallagher
• Brookfield Asset Management Reinsurance Partners in its $5.1 billion acquisition of American National Group
• Sabre Corporation in its sale of the AirCentre suite of flight and crew management software solutions to CAE Inc. for $392.5 million
• NXP Semiconductors in its $1.76 billion acquisition of Marvell Technology Group’s WiFi and Bluetooth connectivity assets
• Silver Lake Partners in its acquisition of a majority stake in ServiceMax from GE Digital
• Nightstar Therapeutics in its $877 million acquisition by Biogen
• Amadeus IT Group in its $1.52 billion acquisition of TravelClick from Thoma Bravo
• Permira Funds in the $1.75 billion acquisition of Duff & Phelps
• Broadcom Corporation in its $37 billion sale to Avago Technologies Limited
• Nokia Corporation in the $7.2 billion sale of its devices and services business to Microsoft Corporation
• LSI Corporation in its $6.6 billion acquisition by Avago Technologies Limited (Singapore)
• SanDisk Corporation in its $19 billion acquisition by Western Digital Corporation and its $1.1 billion acquisition of Fusion-io, Inc.
• Hewlett-Packard Company in its acquisition of Voltage Security, Inc.
• XL Group in connection with the $570 million sale of XL Insurance’s (Bermuda) wholly owned subsidiary XL Life Reinsurance to GreyCastle Holdings
• the special committee of the board of directors of Steinway Musical Instruments in the $438 million acquisition of Steinway by an affiliate of Kohlberg & Company
• Global Indemnity plc in its acquisition of American Reliable Insurance Company from Assurant, Inc.
• SCOR Global Life U.S. Holdings Inc., a subsidiary of SCOR SE, in its $750 million acquisition of Generali U.S. Holdings, Inc.
• Hamilton Insurance Group in its acquisition of S.A.C. Re and its initial formation and capital raise
• Jackson National Life Insurance Company in its $621 million acquisition of the U.S. life reinsurance operations of Swiss Re
• Harbor Point Limited in its $3 billion merger of equals with Max Capital Group

Selected Awards and Recognition

Ms. Nijjar has received numerous accolades and honors in recognition of her work, including:

• Law360 Mergers and Acquisitions MVP 
• Variety Dealmakers Impact Report 
• The Hollywood Reporter Top Dealmaker 
• The Deal Top Women in Dealmaking
• The American Lawyer Dealmaker of the Year (twice) in connection with her representations of (i) Activision Blizzard in its acquisition by Microsoft and (ii) Livongo Health in its acquisition by Teladoc Health
• Bloomberg Law inaugural They’ve Got Next: The 40 Under 40 list, which honored young attorneys nationwide who “represent the best of the future of the legal profession”
• Euromoney’s Women in Business Law Expert Guide as a leading global M&A practitioner
• Daily Journal Top Women Lawyers in California
• Daily Journal 40 Under 40, an annual award given to a select group of California’s rising star attorneys
• Daily Journal California Lawyer Attorneys of the Year (CLAY) awards for innovative work on behalf of Livongo Health in its acquisition by Teladoc Health, Intel Corporation in its acquisition of Mobileye N.V. and Broadcom Corporation in its acquisition by Avago Technologies
• Law360 Rising Star
• South Asian Bar Association of North America Rising Star
• Silicon Valley Business Journal Women of Influence, which recognized Silicon Valley’s most influential business and community leaders
• The Recorder Tech Industry Advisory Team of the Year and Corporate Department of the Year, in which Skadden’s corporate team in California won top honors in numerous categories
• IFLR1000 Woman Leader 
• The Legal 500 U.S., including as part of its M&A Private Practice Powerlist
• Lawdragon’s 500 Leading Lawyers in America and 500 Leading Dealmakers in America