Dealmaker Dialogues Event
Datasite hosted an early morning “Dealmakers Dialogues” event in Hotel Kämp on Tuesday 26.4.2022. The event focused on bringing together M&A community in Finland to share and discuss red-hot M&A year of 2021 and current situation going forward 2022.
”M&A in the Nordic region outpaced the rest of Europe in 2021, breaking its own records and marking a 44.7% year-on-year increase. The value of transactions targeting the Nordics was up 184% in 2021 to $141bn, as at November 2021, according to Bloomberg.” Stated by Datasite editors.
Insights on the current M&A market
Focus of the event was, as could be expected, the current turbulent and violent geopolitical situation resulted from the Russian invasion in Ukraine, and how it impacts the M&A activity and economy in total. Furthermore, there were interesting discussions and insights from the panelists on other drivers affecting dealmaking landscape.
According to the panelists (see list of panelists below), strong dealmaking was a result of various drivers e.g., multiples expansion and availability of cheap funding, level of technology and innovation, and strong governance supported with well-educated workforce.
As for the impact of war in Ukraine, the panel highlighted increased concerns in terms of logistics and insurance, political scrutiny and economic sanctions, resulting timing issues and delays, even complete halts for couple of weeks on strategic initiatives. Dealmaking focus is firmly on PE/VC based deals, whereas spotlight seem to be in energy and renewables, and corporations tend to shift to core businesses.
Inflation was not, at least so far, seen and experienced to have big effect in the Finnish market, although inflation is currently running at 5,8% in Finland (March 2022). Eurozone inflation rate was 7.8% and in US 8,5% (March 2022). However, geopolitical and global economic conditions are so volatile, that inflation impact perception might soon change.
Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG)
ESG has been trending topic in many forums, and this was the case here as well. All panelists emphasized the importance of ESG not only as a necessity, but moreover a value creating aspect of going forward. One simply cannot miss taking ESG into account, despite not being easy to address, and enforce e.g. sustainability in the ever-changing business landscape.
Having discussed with the panelists afterwards, it was insightful to realize how ESG will become an issue for the small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) as well. SMEs which operate in and supply for the larger industrial ecosystems, must be watchful and ready to address how their business, products and services comply with the ESG norms and expectations. Creovista will support is clients and portfolio companies in getting up to speed and getting onboard in the ESG wave. This year we are introducing new practices and partnerships to address ESG for the SME market.
Summary
In summary the panel seemed to convey cautious, but somewhat positive note and highlighted availability of dry powder to fuel M&A and dealmaking on sustainable, technology and renewable energy opportunities supported by softer factors, such as talent acquisition to support growth.
Expert Panelists
Datasite had assembled interesting and representative panel working in the M&A scene: Aleksi Airas, Head of M&A, Fortum; Mikael Laine, SVP, Strategy at Cargotec; Salla Tuominen, Partner, Head of Corporate, DLA Piper; Rosie Corcoran, VP Sales, UK & Nordics, Datasite; Juho Puhakainen, Head of Corporate Finance, SEB; Elizabeth Pfeuti, Moderator, Financial journalist, Rhotic Media.
Contact for more insights
Tommi Huhtala, Managing Partner
Tel. +358 40 568 5839
