• by Wayne Friedman , October 3, 2017

Media, marketing and technology merger-and-acquisition deals and total dollar volume continued to climb during the third quarter, versus earlier in 2017 and a year ago.

Media investment banker Petsky Prunier says there were 860 deals in the third quarter -- versus 804 in the second quarter of 2017 and 775 deals in the third quarter of 2016.

Total deal volume in the third quarter was $58.5 billion against $54.9 billion in the second three months of 2017. A year ago, deals totaled $49.5 billion.

One of the bigger announced deals was Discovery Communications' $14.9 billion deal for Scripps Networks Interactive. Additionally, there was another traditional TV-based deal: Liberty Media’s planned buy of cable TV commerce network HSN for $2.7 billion, to be combined with Liberty’s QVC shopping TV network.

Digital media/commerce deals had the biggest dollar volume and highest number of deals: $21.8 billion (down 33% from the previous quarter) and 338 deals (2% higher). Marketing technology deals were next, amounting to $8 billion in value -- up 18% and 6% higher in the number of deals, 270.

Traditional media deals were at $7.98 billion, growing 203% in volume and 11% higher in the number of deals: 72. This does not include Discovery-Scripps.

Digital advertising companies were at $3.8 billion, up 94% in value and down 3% in the number of deals to 70. Agency/marketing services were at $2 billion, down 53% in volume but 38% higher in the number of deals: 110.