Bird & Bird's Corporate team in Helsinki, led by partner Maria Carlsson and assisted by associates Iina-Mari Supperi and Laura Kallinen, has advised the sellers of Visual Components on the sale of the company to German-Chinese robotics giant, KUKA. Corum Group acted as financial advisors to the sellers in close cooperation with the Bird & Bird team.

Visual Components has operations in Finland, Germany and the US, and specialises in 3D simulation software for factory planning. The company's technology is ground-breaking in its field; 3D simulation is one of the key elements for technological innovations such as artificial intelligence, virtual and augmented reality and cloud/IOT technology.

KUKA is a global automation corporation with sales of around EUR 3 billion. As one of the world’s leading suppliers of intelligent automation solutions, KUKA offers customers fully automated systems for the automotive, electronics, consumer goods, e-commerce, healthcare and service robotics industries for example. The Group is headquartered in Augsburg, Germany.

The Bird & Bird team included partner Mikko Ahonen, who was responsible for warranty and indemnity insurance, as well as partner Ella Mikkola and associate Maija Puustinen who were in charge of intellectual property rights-related drafting. In addition, lawyers from across various practice groups, including Sami Tuominen (Tax), Päivi Tammilehto (Competition & EU), Kimmo Sundqvist and Elina Saloranta (Corporate), Aleksi Muhonen (Dispute Resolution) and Jutta Nieminen (Employment) formed part of the team.