In this Industry Report

Highlights:

• Q4 2009 has been a significantly stronger quarter on the M&A front. With 43 deals accounted for, the activity reaches levels comparable to the second half of 2007.
• Confirming the excellent market conditions for buyouts, big players have again been noticeably active in their acquisitions, including Apple, Google, Telefonica, Cisco, Twitter and Nuance Communications.
• Google's acquisition of AdMob was among the most commented, as it confirmed Google's intentions in the mobile advertising space.
• On a year-on-year basis the number of funding deals grew 24% to 68 deals. The number of deals is also stable compared to the 68 recorded in Q3 2009. In terms of value the total Q4 2009 recorded funding volume shrank 29% year-on-year to $475m, which also represents a 10% decline compared to the previous quarter.
• The average deal value dropped from $7.9m in Q3 2009 to $7m in Q4 2009.
• By a considerable margin, the US leads the mobile funding scene, with no less than 149 deals out of 237 and 68% of the $2.86bn funding.

In this report:

• Mobile M&A: fertile context for strategic buys
• Company M&A Spotlight: Research In Motion
• Mobile funding: many deals, low value
• App Store spurs new wave of software push
• Q4 2009: top funding deals in mobile
• Regional analysis: US still largely ahead
• Mobile Music, part of a grander scheme

List of tables and charts:

Mobile Media Intelligence

Author/s

Julien Theys

Territories covered

Western Europe

Austria, Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Sweden, UK,

Central and Eastern Europe

Russia,

North America

Canada, USA,

South and Central America

Brazil,

Africa and Middle East

Israel,

Asia-Pacific

China, India, Japan, Singapore,

Companies mentioned