CommScope veteran CLO to retire

Burk Wyatt, chief legal officer (CLO) and secretary with CommScope Holding Company, will retire on June 1 after a career of more than 25 years with the Hickory, North Carolina-based company.

Wyatt joined CommScope in 1996 as its first general counsel. His work has most recently involved leading the company’s legal efforts around the planned spin-off of its Home Networks business.

Wyatt advised on CommScope’s 2011 acquisition by funds affiliated with The Carlyle Group to become a private company. He then guided the company through its IPO in 2013 to become publicly traded for the second time, now on Nasdaq.

Justin Choi will succeed Wyatt as CLO. He was most recently executive vice president, general counsel, secretary and chief compliance officer with Anixter International from 2012 until its sale in 2020. He was previously general counsel and held senior legal positions at Andrew Corporation, Trustwave Holdings, Avaya and Lucent Technologies.

His experience includes advising boards and executive management teams on corporate governance, risk and crisis management and M&A transactions.

‘As CommScope’s first and only ever [CLO], Burk has been fundamental to the company’s development and success,’ president and CEO Chuck Treadway says in a statement. ‘Over the course of his 25 years of legal and strategic stewardship, CommScope has grown from an approximately $400 mn revenue business with an employee base of 1,000 into a leading operator with approximately $8 bn in annual revenue and an employee base of well over 30,000. On behalf of the entire CommScope team, I want to express my gratitude to Burk and wish him the very best in his well-deserved retirement.

‘As we look at the priorities in front of us, we are pleased to welcome a leader and attorney of Justin’s caliber as [CLO], and are confident his expertise and relevant industry experience will support the company’s execution and help lead our talented legal department into the future.’