M&A activity declines 34% during 2009
Thursday January 14, 2010 , 2 min Read
Deal activity however picked up in second half of year
During 2009, Indian companies were involved in a total of 356 M&A deals, down 34% from 2008, according to a study by Venture Intelligence (http://www.ventureintelligence.in), a research service focused on Private Equity and M&A transaction activity in India. These figures were lower than that for 2008, which witnessed a total of 543 M&A deals (including 265 deals with an announced value of $26.4 billion). However, M&A activity in the second half of 2009 which witnessed 204 deals, was higher compared to H1 '09 which had witnessed a total of 152 M&A deals.
In the largest M&A deal by announced value, UltraTech Cement merged Samruddhi Cement with itself to form India’s largest cement company. This was followed by ONGC Videsh acquiring UK-listed Imperial Energy, which has oil assets in Russia, for $1.9 billion and Sanofi-Aventis’ acquisition of Hyderabad based Shantha Biotechnics for $625 million.
Source: Venture Intelligence
Over 56% of the deals in 2009 were domestic acquisitions, as against the 43% in 2008. Indian companies cut down on their global acquisitions drastically executing just 85 outbound transactions in 2009 as compared to the 230 in the previous year.
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The US was the most preferred destination for Indian companies which acquired 22 American companies in 2009. The US was followed by the UK and Australia (with 9 deals each). The acquirers in 28 of the 70 inbound deals during 2009 were US-based companies, followed by German firms with ten deals and French firms with eight deals.
The IT & ITES and Manufacturing industries accounted for most number of acquisitions during 2009 contributing 22% and 18% respectively. Healthcare, Energy and BFSI were the next most active industries for M&A activity.
About Venture Intelligence
Venture Intelligence, a division of Chennai-based TSJ Media Pvt. Ltd., is the leading source of information on private equity and M&A transactions in India. For more information, please visit http://www.ventureintelligence.in