India Inc announced M&A deals worth $54.7 bn in 2017, says report

Corporate India's merger and acquisition deal value stood at $54.7 billion in 2017, and telecommunications, technology and financial service were the top three sectors in terms of deal value, says a report.

According to global deal-tracking firm Mergermarket, as many as 379 M&A deals were announced worth  $54.7 billion in 2017, a slight decrease compared to the record high value registered in 2016, which saw 421 deals valued at $59.7 billion.

Sectorwise, telecommunications contributed 37.2 per cent to India's total deal value in 2017.

The $12.7 billion Idea Cellular-Vodafone India deal was the largest transaction in 2017, while Reliance Jio Infocomm's $3.7 billion acquisition in wireless spectrum, towers, fibre and media convergence node assets of Reliance Communication (RCom) was the second largest deal in 2017.

The total annual deal value in the financial services sector increased by 34.3 per cent to $6.9 billion in 2017 from $5.1 billion in the year-ago period.

The largest deal in the financial service sector in 2017 was the $2.4 billion acquisition of Bharat Financial Inclusion by Induslnd Bank that was also the country's fourth top deal in 2017.

"The consolidation in the sector intensified and more deals are likely to be announced among non-banking companies, especially insurers, and is likely to continue to be strong until 2018," the report said.

The report noted that India's inbound activity during 2017 (187 deals, $23.5 billion) experienced a slip in both deal value and deal count terms.

According to Mergermarket intelligence, although valuations within the tech sector are usually considered overpriced, interest from the US and China dealmakers looking to India is still going to continue.