Optimera: CB Insights: 3,358 tech exits in 2016, ‘unicorn births’ down 68%

onsdag 1 februari 2017

CB Insights: 3,358 tech exits in 2016, ‘unicorn births’ down 68%

CB Insights has published its annual report of how tech companies performed in 2016 when it came to funding and exits.

CB Insights notes that there were 3,358 total tech exits in the year (3,260 M&A exits, 98 IPOs), down 4% over 2015.

As for who is doing the buying, CB Insights reports that Google, which disclosed acquisitions of some 18 companies in 2016, took the crown in terms of volume (not value), with Salesforce and Accenture tying in second place. (Why not value? It’s harder to calculate this, as the price for many of the deals never gets disclosed.)

Meanwhile, startups that focus on advertising, sales and marketing were far and away biggest category for both sales and IPOs, coming in at 54 companies exiting, with some biggies among them, such as mobile ad company AppLovin‘ selling to Orient Hontai Capital for $1.4 billion. In second came business intelligence and analytics services.