Buyouts in Europe's German-speaking region fall to pre-pandemic levels

Multibillion-euro deals fell out of favor in Europe's German-speaking countries as buyouts in the region returned to 2018 levels.

This year, the DACH region—which comprises Germany, Austria and Switzerland—has seen an estimated €63.2 billion ($66.9 billion) deployed across 480 PE buyouts. At the current pace, buyout activity is on course to be down considerably from last year's peak of 758 deals worth a combined €107.4 billion.
   

The largest deal announced this year was Asterion Industrial Partners' acquisition of German energy utility STEAG for €2.8 billion. The second largest deal was Silver Lake's take private of Germany's Software AG for €2.4 billion.

Both deals were considerably smaller than two large telecoms infrastructure deals that accounted for a large share of 2022's total deal value in the region: the $16.3 billion acquisition of Vantage Towers by a group led by GIC and KKR; and the €8.9 billion acquisition of Deutsche Funkturm, the tower business of Deutsche Telekom, by Canada's Brookfield and DigitalBridge Group.

The largest PE buyout on record for the region was Cinven and Advent International's €17.2 billion carveout of TK Elevator from its parent company ThyssenKrupp, in 2020.

Featured image by Allan Baxter/Getty Images

This article originally appeared on PitchBook News