2021 Tech Trends: Later-stage companies prefer IPOs over M&As

2021 was a record year for equity investments in Israeli tech companies, with the ecosystem boasting $26.6 billion in capital funding, but the past year was also a phenomenal one for IPOs and acquisitions.

Sixty Israeli companies went public this year having raised an accumulated $4.14 billion. This nearly triples the 22 IPOs completed in 2020, which raised an accumulated $1.7 billion. The immense growth in public offerings is part of a wider international trend that saw $153 billion raised in IPOs and $163 billion in SPACs, according to data compiled by Dealogic.

According to Start-Up Nation Finder, of the 60 Israeli companies that went public in 2021, 44 chose to do so on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange. While deals there were far smaller, there were two above $100 million: Glassbox $100 million and Nayax $210 million.

Nine of the companies rang the bell at Nasdaq, including Monday.com which raised $574 million in its IPO. An additional three went public on NYSE including, the largest deal of the year: SentinelOne, which raised $1.2 billion

2021 Tech Trends – Leading Tech Sectors

2021 Tech Trends – Dominant Investors

2021 Tech Trends – A Global Comparison

2021 Tech Trends – A Unicorn Assembly Line

Although the rise in the number of acquisitions may have been more modest (131 up from 91 in 2020), their accumulated value more than doubled from roughly $4 billion in 2020 to $7.9 billion in 2021, breaking all-time records. The largest deal last year was the acquisition of XM Cyber by the Schwartz Group for $700 million.

One trend that stood out last year was the increase in the number of Israeli startups acquired by Israel-based companies. There were 40 such deals carried out in 2021, the highest number on record, up from 21 in 2020, indicating that the Israeli innovation ecosystem is maturing.·