May 1, 2013 M&A ACTIVITY IN THE INFORMATION INDUSTRY, AFTER A STRONG 2012, SLOWS IN Q1 2013

According to Berkery Noyes’ latest data, transaction volume in the Information Industry decreased two percent since Q4 2012. Deal flow in the latter part of 2012 was driven by several factors, including an expected rise in capital gains taxes in the beginning of 2013. 

Transaction value decreased 62 percent, from $45.3 billion in Q4 2012 to $17.4 billion in Q1 2013. The industry’s highest value during the last 15 months occurred in Q4 2012, which was one component behind this quarter-to-quarter value decrease. In addition, the median revenue multiple between Q4 2012 and Q1 2013 declined from 1.8x to 1.6x, while the median EBITDA multiple fell from 9.5x to 8.3x. 

Private equity acquirers accounted for 13 percent of the industry’s transaction volume in year-to-date, which was nearly the same as in Q4 2012. The Information Industry’s largest overall deal in Q1 2013 was CVC Capital Partners’ announced acquisition of Cerved Group SpA, a corporate information database, for $1.5 billion. 

Regarding other markets in the Information Industry, M&A volume in the broad based governance, risk, and compliance (GRC) space increased 17 percent between 2011 and 2012. There were several associated transactions within the finance vertical in Q1 2013, such as Temenos Group’s acquisition of TriNovus, a provider of SaaS based compliance solutions.

As for the Health & Pharmaceutics segment, the highest value deal in the quarter involved Epocrates, a mobile point-of-care medical application. Epocrates was acquired by athenahealth for $216 million. Our previous post highlighted a 33 percent increase in mobile M&A volume during Q1 2013.