MILAN (Reuters – Leonardo, an Italian defense group said Tuesday that its U.S. division DRS agreed to sell all its stake in Advanced Acoustic Concepts(AAC), its joint venture with a French subsidiary Thales.

In a separate statement, Thales said that under the deal, which is expected to close in the second half of the year, its unit Thales Defense & Security (TDSI) would acquire DRS’s stake and gain full ownership of AAC, which operates in the fields of advanced sonar, training and knowledge management systems.

The companies did not provide financial information about the transaction, and Leonardo wasn’t immediately available to comment.

Leonardo has reduced its assets to concentrate on core functions such as electronics and defense, helicopters, and satellite communications.

Alessandro Profumo is the Leonardo chief executive and said that this transaction represented a “further stage in the process of rededicating the DRS portfolio.”

($1 = 0.9349 euros)