Latham & Watkins has advised Advent on the US$720 million sale of Ultra I&C Mission Solutions to Booz Allen Hamilton, placing defence technology, government contracts and merger control at the centre of another high-value private equity exit.
The transaction, announced on June 22, 2026, involves Booz Allen acquiring the Ultra Mission Solutions business from Cobham Ultra Group, an Advent portfolio company, subject to customary closing conditions.
Ultra Mission Solutions is not a routine software asset. The business specialises in mission-critical software, encryption and edge-compute products used in defence and national security settings, where legal execution depends on regulatory confidence, customer continuity and operational security.
Booz Allen has said the business will operate as a wholly owned subsidiary after completion, with closing expected in the second quarter of its fiscal year 2027, ending September 30, 2026.
Practitioner consequence sits in the breadth of the advisory work rather than the headline price alone. Latham’s corporate team was led by partners Amber Banks, Brian Mangino, Thomas Engelhardt and Huw Thomas, with the wider mandate covering tax, benefits, labour, intellectual property, data privacy and cybersecurity, US antitrust, ex-US antitrust, Hart-Scott-Rodino matters, trade controls, anti-bribery and anti-corruption, finance and government contracts. That spread reflects how defence technology transactions have moved beyond purchase agreement mechanics into a more demanding exercise in regulatory sequencing and risk allocation.
The advisory roster also shows the level of scrutiny now attached to strategic buyers acquiring sensitive technology assets from private equity owners. Booz Allen retained Jefferies LLC as financial adviser, PwC as accounting and tax adviser, King & Spalding LLP as legal adviser and Renaissance Strategic Advisors as strategic industry adviser.
Ultra Mission Solutions and Advent retained Baird as financial adviser, KPMG as accounting and tax adviser and Latham & Watkins as legal adviser. For law firms, the number and range of advisers is not transaction theatre; it reflects the pressure around defence procurement, cyber capability, export controls and government-linked customer relationships.
The deal carries a wider lesson for in-house counsel advising buyers, sellers or portfolio companies in regulated technology markets. Where the asset involves encryption, edge computing, mission software or defence customers, legal teams need to prepare the regulatory workstream before signing, not after it. Hart-Scott-Rodino analysis, non-US merger control, trade controls, cybersecurity warranties, government contract diligence and anti-corruption review can all affect timing, deal certainty and buyer appetite.
Latham & Watkins, Advent and Booz Allen Hamilton now move toward a September 30, 2026 closing window in a transaction that will require counsel to keep merger control, defence contracting and technology-risk diligence aligned until completion.