• by Tyler Loechner  @mp_tyler, September 5, 2013

The August 2013 M&A and Investment Summary from Petsky Prunier revealed Marketing Technology as the most active segment in terms of transactions. It was also the segment with the highest reported value of transactions. Marketing Technology companies accounted for 77 of the 384 deals announced in August for a reported value of $1.4 billion. Additionally, Marketing Technology led in VC/Growth Capital Investors. Of 195 VC/Growth Capital Investor deals announced in August, 49 of them were in Marketing Technology, totaling a reported $458 million.

Looking inside the Marketing Technology segment shows that Mobile Technology accounted for 11 of the transactions, most for a specified category. However, the "Other" category truly led the way with 22 of the month's transactions. According to the report, "Other" included Ad Serving, Analytics/Reporting, Marketing Research Software, and more. The "Other" category leading is likely a result of the high number of "point solutions" available within the Marketing Technology industry.

Online Targeting/Optimization, which had nine transactions, reported an aggregate value of $420 million, or about 45% of the total reported value of Marketing Technology transactions in August. Transactions in the Social Technology space reported $190 million in value, or 20% of the segment's total reported value.

Looking outside of the Marketing Technology segment, there were 28 Digital Advertising transactions in August for a reported $493 million. There were also 24 transactions in the Agency & Marketing Services segment in August for a reported $81 million.

When breaking the Digital Advertising transactions down, Digital Video led the way with six acquisitions for a reported value of $26.5 million. However, despite announcing fewer transactions than Digital Video, the Mobile Marketing category (four transactions) blew the field away in reported value. Three of the four transactions reported value, which added up to $235 million thanks to Millennial Media's $232 million acquisition of mobile ad network JumpTap. AOL's acquisition of Adap.TV fell under the Marketing Technology category.

While Digital Agencies accounted 25% of the transactions in the Agency & Marketing Services segment, the reported value of those transactions ($60.7 million) made up nearly 75% of the segment's entire reported value.

Month-over-month deal activity increased 6% in August, but reported value was down significantly thanks in large part to July's Publicis/Omnicom deal. The 384 transactions in August tied June for the second most this year behind only January (408).