Marketing automation sector rises to 31% of global M&A deals within adtech during Q3 2015
The number of adtech-martech M&A deals in the marketing automation sector have risen to make up for nearly a third (31 per cent) of all deals during Q3 2015. This rose from 10 per cent in Q2.
This increase in marketing automation deals coincides with a decrease in deals in the advertising platform space (advertising platform related deals fell from 35 per cent in Q2 to 7 per cent in Q3).
According to Results International, which released the figures, this reflects a growing emphasis on cross-channel marketing automation for customer engagement as well as ad platforms repositioning themselves as broader marketing automation businesses.
Total activity was up by 11 per cent in Q3 2015, with 112 deals in July-September as against 101 in April-June.
The sectors also gaining market share during Q3 include mobile, e-commerce and video. Conversely, deals involving social media technology dropped from 20 per cent of the market in Q2 2015 to 11 per cent in Q3.
The research also found that 13 per cent of the deals in Q3 2015 involved private equity buyers (either directly or via portfolio companies), up from only 3 per cent in Q2 2015.
The study additionally found that three-quarters of deals (75 per cent) in the first nine months of the year were by companies that made just the one acquisition. However, WPP remains the most prolific participant with nine transactions in Q1-3 2015.
Although North America remains the most active region for M&A deals in the adtech-martech sector, with half of the total global deal volume in Q3 2015, other regions are eating away at its dominance.
Looking at Q1-3 2015 compared to the same period last year, North America’s market share has dropped from 62 per cent to 53 per cent, with APAC the big winner. Deals in the region accounted for 21 per cent of deal activity in July-September, up from 16 per cent in Apr-Jun.