The ten biggest companies in tech have put the brakes on acquisitions
The ten largest tech companies in the US have only made 35 acquisitions in the first half of this year, according to CB Insights. If things continue at this rate, big tech will have made 61 acquisitions total in 2017- a full 25 % less than last year.
Across the board, mergers and acquisitions have slowed since they peaked in 2013, at which point these same players accounted for 119 acquisitions total.
Since then, Google has been by far the most active acquirer, making a full 100 acquisitions since 2013.
Yahoo, on the other hand, was a big player in 2013 but had dramatically changed strategies by 2015. This year it was Yahoo which got acquired. The former tech giant is now combined with AOL to form Oath - a subsidiary of Verizon.
Intel - while only one acquisition deep so far this year - takes the cake for most money spent. The company bought the Israeli autonomous vehicle company Mobileye for $15.3 billion in March.