Davis Polk is advising J.P. Morgan as financial adviser to Novell, Inc. in connection with its approximately $2.2 billion acquisition by Attachmate Corporation. The transaction, which is expected to close in the first quarter of 2011, is subject to customary closing conditions, including regulatory approvals and clearance under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act, and is also conditioned upon the closing of the proposed sale of certain intellectual property assets to CPTN Holdings LLC.

Waltham, Massachusetts-based Novell is a leader in Intelligent Workload Management, helping organizations securely deliver and manage computing services across physical, virtual and cloud computing environments. Seattle, Washington-based Attachmate, owned by an investment group led by Francisco Partners, Golden Gate Capital and Thoma Bravo, enables IT organizations to extend mission-critical services and assures they are managed, secure and compliant.

The Davis Polk corporate team includes partner George R. Bason Jr. and associates Carson T. Stewart and Alexander N. Macleod, all of the New York office.