Jan-Mar PE investments at USD 3 bn: Grant Thornton

There were 89 private equity transactions worth USD 644 million in March this year, following which the PE investment deal tally for the January-March quarter stood at USD 2.96 billion, says a Grant Thornton report.
According to the global tax, accounting and advisory firm, the January-March PE investment deal tally registered a 14 per cent jump in terms of value of deals and 27 per cent growth in terms of number of transactions.
During the same quarter of the previous year, there were 221 PE-deals worth USD 2.59 billion.
"Growth was driven by seven big ticket investments over USD 100 million compared to only four in Q1-2015," the report said.

A sector wise analysis shows that the PE/VC activity was led by the E-commerce sector, contributing 33 per cent of investment values and startups attracting 66 per cent of investment volumes.
The quarter saw one of the biggest exits by KKR from an India focused investment -- the US private equity giant sold its stake in Alliance Tire group to Japan's Yokohama Rubber for a consideration of USD 1.2 billion.

Other key sectors which witnessed big ticket investments (over USD 100 million each) this quarter are banking and financial services, pharma, healthcare, biotech and infrastructure.
"PE/VC investments, on the other hand, continue to be attracted to the E-commerce or consumer technology sector with the quarter witnessing USD 970 million across 28 investments," Prashant Mehra - Partner at Grant Thornton India said.

He added that "notably, more than 180 startups received investments of more than USD 454 million which is encouraging".