1st Half 2023 Media & Marketing Industry Trends

1ST HALF 2023 KEY HIGHLIGHTS

The largest transaction in 1st Half 2023 was Ultimate Fighting Championship’s announced acquisition of World Wrestling Entertainment, an American professional wrestling promotion company, for $9.3 billion.

Three of the top ten notable transactions in 1st Half 2023 occurred in the Entertainment segment’s gaming sector: Savvy Games Group’s announced acquisition of Scopely for $4.90 billion; Aristocrat Leisure’s acquisition of NeoGames for $1.19 billion; and Sega’s acquisition of Rovio for $602 million.

There were 86 financially sponsored transactions with an aggregate value of $5.58 billion, representing 17 percent of the total volume and 20 percent of the total value.

1ST HALF 2023 KEY TRENDS

Total transaction volume in 1st Half 2023 decreased by 10 percent over 2nd Half 2022, from 597 to 537.

Total transaction value increased 82 percent from $15.35 billion in 2nd Half 2022 to $27.95 billion in 1st Half 2023.

The median revenue multiple shifted from 1.3x in 2nd Half 2022 to 1.7x in 1st Half 2023. After falling from 11.6x in 1st Half 2022 to 9.3x in 2nd Half 2022, the median EBITDA multiple declined to 8.4x in 1st Half 2023.

M&A MARKET OVERVIEW

Berkery Noyes tracked 2,805 Media and Marketing transactions between 2021 and 1st Half 2023 of which 535 disclosed financial terms, and calculated the aggregate transaction value to be $339.97 billion. Based on known transaction values, we project values of 2,270 undisclosed transactions to be $43.99 billion, totaling $383.96 billion worth of transactions tracked over the past two and a half years.

Transactions from 1st Half 2021 to 1st Half 2023 with enterprise values above $160 million received a median revenue multiple of 4.7x, whereas those in the $10-$160 million range garnered a median revenue multiple of 2.5x.