India’s deal street was salvaged by the record strategic investment made in Jio Platforms and Reliance Retail Ventures Ltd (RRVL). These two arms of Reliance Industries accounted for 25 per cent of the value, a PwC India tabulation has shown.

If it was not for the multiple transactions in these two entities, the numbers for 2020 would have looked tepid. However, experts feel that the trend is likely to continue as consolidation is expected to drive M&A activity in India.

While initially deal activity was affected because of the Covid-19 pandemic, it received a boost after Jio Platforms garnered over $16 billion (Rs 1,18,318 crore) by selling a 25.24 per cent stake and Reliance Retail saw $6.4 billion (Rs 47,265 crore) of investments as it divested around 9 per cent shareholding. Together, they accounted for over 25 per cent of the $80-billion deal activity witnessed across 1,260 transactions.

According to PwC India report titled, “Deals in India: Annual review and outlook for 2021”, the total deals in value terms showed a 7 per cent increase compared with last year. The report added that 2020 recorded 17 deals in the billion-dollar bracket, which was double the number of such deals (9) recorded in 2019.

Ajay Arora, partner and national leader of investment banking, at EY India told PTI that the first half of this calendar year saw a major decline in M&As but in the second half, it saw a strong bounce back when deals rose nearly 40 per cent. “I expect this strong momentum to continue in 2021, primarily driven by a significant appetite of PEs for buyouts and an uptick in inbound deals,” he said.