130 equity deals garner $4.8 billion for India

Overall deal activity in 2016 has remained stable with 3% increase in the deal values, driven by strong M&A growth. Photo: Zeebiz Webdesk

India received $4.8 billion from 130 equity deals in July 2016.

However there was a 16% y-o-y fall in deal volumes, primarily on account of a substantial decline in private equity (PE) investments, Grant Thornton analysts, Prashant Mehra said in a report.

“Overall deal activity in 2016 has remained stable with 3% increase in the deal values, driven by strong M&A growth and PE investments sustaining deal volumes,” the report stated.

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The largest inbound deal came from the pharma, healthcare & biotech sector which contributed nearly 40% of total deal value.

Among the mergers and acquisition (M&A) deals, Nirma Ltd topped the charts with acquisition of Lafarge cement assets garnering $1,400 million.

Fosun Pharmaceuticals took $1.3 billion in majority stake deal in the acquisition of Gland pharma.

There were large domestic transactions with overall values growing 1.7 times driven by three deals in the billion dollar club accounting for more than half of domestic deal values.

IT&ITES, energy & natural resources sector also witnessed big ticket deals while the startup sector saw higher volumes driven by increasing consolidation in the sector, the report added.

In line with previous trends, the month was dominated by investments in startups which contributed to 70% of total volumes and nearly 30% of values. Interestingly, more than 50% of investment volumes were towards early stage funding towards start-ups, the report added.