5 Several large venture exits in overall meager year
While capital investments and fundraising were at record high levels, the number of exits was at a historic low. However, there were some notable large exits in the segment.
The development in the different Nordic countries is convergent. Traditionally, the activity in Sweden and Finland has been much higher than in Denmark and Norway. The number of exits in Denmark and Norway increased from 2018, from 5 to 8 in Denmark, and from 6 to 11 in Norway. Finland and Sweden experienced sharp declines in the exit activity. In Finland, only 11 exits were made in 2019, as compared to 21 in 2018. For Sweden, the decline was even bigger in absolute terms, falling from 38 to 18 exits.
The number of exits in ICT declined from 43 in 2018 to 28 in 2019, but despite the sharp decline, tech companies are involved in well over 50 percent of the exits. Following ICT is health care and life science with 9 exits where the number of exits has been stable over the last three years. The energy sector experienced an increased number of exits with 6 companies being exited in 2019, compared with 2 exits in the previous three years combined. Exit activity in industrials fell for the third straight year to three exits, down from 23 in the peak year of 2016.
We find some of the large exits in the health care and life science sector. Karo Pharma acquired pharmaceuticals company Trimb Healthcare from Avista Capital Partners for €321 million. Other large exits in the sector were Ampersand Capital Partners sale of biotechnology company Gyros Protein Technologies to Mesa Laboratories for €163 million, and Investor Growth Capital’s sale of Memira to Bergman Group.
At the same time as the number of exits was at historically low levels, capital investment (read more) and fundraising (read more) were at an all-time high.