Viavi Solutions struck a deal to acquire Spirent Communications for £1 billion, a move the former claims will create a leading provider of testing, assurance and security products for R&D laboratories, service providers, data centres and mission critical infrastructure.

The deal has been unanimously recommended by the Spirent board but is subject to shareholder and regulatory approval.

UK-based Spirent sells products, services and managed solutions in the test and measurement segment covering areas including 5G, SD-WAN, cloud and autonomous vehicles.

Viavi targets its test and assurance solutions to a range of industries including the telecommunications segment, cloud providers, enterprises, and those in the first responder, military, aerospace and railway sectors.   

In its statement, Viavi explained combining the companies “highly complementary” portfolios and expertise would result in greater R&D, design and engineering capabilities which would accelerate technology development.

Among the research areas expected to be benefit are AI, machine learning, security, cloud native architecture and automation. It also indicated the “additional financial and operational resources” available would allow expansion into new vertical markets.

“The combination of Viavi and Spirent’s current and future product offerings will position the combined group to bring to market innovative solutions across high-growth cloud service providers, enterprise/IT networks, 5G private networks, 6G+, and positioning, navigation and timing verticals,” it added.

Viavi expects to achieve annual synergies of up to $75 million two years after completion, which is estimated at H2 2024.

Related to the deal, private equity company Silver Lake invested $400 million in Viavi.