Overview
LUMA’s Q3 2020 Market Report covers the public and private markets during Q3 2020. Following a particularly challenging Q2 for M&A, Q3 marked the start of a turnaround as we witnessed the largest M&A quarter of 2020 throughout our coverage sectors. While overall volume was still down ~40% relative to Q3 2019, the sequential quarterly increase in scaled, strategic deal activity is a strong signal of confidence returning to the M&A market. Both Ad Tech and MarTech saw several notable scaled transactions and Digital Content led the way from a scaled-deal perspective, as Gaming and Streaming Audio drove strategic activity. The D2C sector continued its momentum as well, with 3 scaled transactions, including acquisitions by Uber and Bayer.
The IPO market continues to be red hot and is on pace to become one of the biggest in years for US issuances in the past two decades, accumulating more than $95Bn raised in 2020 year-to-date. In addition to traditional IPOs, technology companies have also leveraged both direct listings and Special Purpose Acquisition Companies (SPACs) to enter the public markets.
Highlights for the quarter include:
• TransUnion’s acquisitions of Tru Optik and Signal to further solidify its identity solutions for marketing use-cases
• Several acquisitions in the Mobile Gaming publishing and monetization space
• Continued strategic interest in Streaming Audio, highlighted by SiriusXM’s $325MM acquisition of Stitcher and Apple’s acquisition of Scout FM, among others
• Uber’s all-stock acquisition of food-delivery service Postmates for $2.65Bn
• The public listings of Asana, BigCommerce, Palantir, Snowflake, and Unity
• A range of notable financing rounds across Ad Tech, MarTech, Digital Content, and D2C
Download the report for full access and watch Terry Kawaja and Conor McKenna discuss their insights on the sector.
