Our Year in Deals 2025

Consumer

We have seen improving activity across the consumer sector through 2025, notwithstanding the tough market that many businesses in the sector continue to experience. On the travel & leisure side, economic conditions driving some delayed departures have shown signs of easing, leading to a stronger finish to 2025 from an M&A activity standpoint. We anticipate this increased activity will continue into 2026. For travel, businesses offering luxury, tailormade or highly specialist and niche offerings will continue to stand out from the crowd, alongside innovative travel technology and AI-led businesses that will disrupt the traditional landscape. 

For leisure, the growth in the experience economy will drive appetite with consumers prioritising memorable experiences, health & wellness, sustainability and social connections more and more. From a food & beverage perspective, M&A activity remained resilient throughout 2025 despite ongoing economic uncertainty and rising input costs. F&B branded businesses saw significant traction from trade buyers and private equity, highlighting sustained confidence in the category, which is encouraging for the sector.

Moving into 2026, the brand led momentum seen last year is expected to continue, with innovation playing a critical role. There will be greater emphasis on healthier products, recipe reformulation, and strategies to manage rising ingredient costs. Businesses that combine strong R&D capabilities with technical solutions will be particularly attractive to both trade acquirers and private equity backed platforms.

Healthcare

We have seen continued activity in the healthcare and pharma services sectors through 2025, the external environment including US tariffs and the rise in NI and NLW following the October 2024 budget has caused some distractions and delays but the market remains resilient. We have worked on deals across all areas of healthcare and pharma services with both owner entrepreneur and investor backed businesses. Demand for asset backed social care businesses has increased with key interest from overseas real estate investors, the international buyers along with Private Equity continue to be interested in pharma services and med tech assets and with the government 10-year plan coming into play we see real opportunity to those providing private and public healthcare services. The 2026 outlook looks encouraging for the healthcare and pharma services M&A environment, we expect to see M&A activity from national and international trade along with continued PE, Real Estate and Family Office investment. 
  

Financial services

2025 saw a slowdown in broader financial services M&A, yet certain segments remained resilient. Wealth management continued to attract strong investor interest, driven by the UK advice market’s recurring revenue models and defensible client relationships, despite heightened regulatory scrutiny following the FCA’s multi-firm review. Private equity remained a key catalyst across sectors, with lending showing clear signs of recovery amid improving credit conditions. Insurance distribution also sustained steady deal flow, particularly among brokers and MGAs, as consolidators increasingly looked beyond the UK to European markets for growth opportunities. 

Looking ahead, wealth management and lending are the ones to watch in 2026 as private equity-backed investments reach maturity—there is a lot to play for. We also anticipate the professional services sector will follow a similar trend to wealth management, given its highly fragmented nature and investors’ focus on scalable platforms and recurring revenue streams. Financial Services is entering a new phase where governance, cultural alignment, and client outcomes matter just as much as capital deployment.

TMT

2025 was a strong and highly productive year for our TMT team, which was delivered against a still‑challenging M&A backdrop. Total deal values across the market rose significantly (in part supported by the landmark £75bn Revolut acquisition), excluding this, values were only modestly lower reflecting a market that remained active despite mixed conditions across sectors. Deal volumes varied by segment, with IT Services, Media and Software softer year‑on‑year, while Telecoms showed encouraging growth. Although private equity activity was also quieter compared to 2024, high‑quality assets continued to attract strong and competitive buyer engagement.

Overall, Software remained the core engine of our deal flow across the year, with standout transactions including the cross‑border sales of Atheon Analytics to Crisp Inc and Meddbase to Cority, alongside Kester Capital’s investment in Addresscloud and the sale of Enroly to Ecctis. In Media, the cross‑border sale of First Group demonstrated sustained appetite for premium creative capabilities. With over 40% of TMT deals in 2025 involving international buyers, our track record in complex, cross‑border mandates continues to differentiate our offering.

Momentum is building strongly into 2026, particularly driven by improving financing conditions, supported by the Bank of England base rate at 3.75% and further cuts anticipated. This should boost confidence across both sponsors and corporates. Technology is positioned to remain one of the most dynamic and active segments, driven by consolidation in AI, digital infrastructure and data‑analytics‑led platforms.

Overall, all indicators point to another busy and opportunity‑rich year for TMT, supported by strengthening macro tailwinds, sustained structural demand for technology, and growing momentum across strategic and financial buyers.

Industrials

2025 presented some challenges for M&A in the Manufacturing and Industrials sector with the first quarter of the year experiencing a decline in deal volumes driven by the volatility created by the changing tariff landscape and global conflicts. The uncertainty caused by the ripple effect of these major market events elevated the levels of caution in the corporate acquirer landscape as they assessed the impact on their own business and the risk of making acquisitions of target businesses that could be affected. That said, quarter 2 saw a rebound with healthy appetite for high-quality assets from both trade buyers and industrial holding companies. We look forward to seeing how the mix of M&A by sub-sector evolves in 2026 and beyond as we anticipate an increase in the attractiveness of businesses operating in areas such as defence, automation, industrial technology and AI infrastructure.

Business support services

The business services sector has remained stable despite economic uncertainty. In 2025, we have seen companies streamlining operations to cut complexity and adapt quickly to changing customer demand. Digital tools and automation became a key driver for companies to scale and improve efficiency whilst ESG has continued to be a key focus, with clients and investors seeking sustainable business practices and responsible business models.  

In 2026, we anticipate UK businesses will remain a strong focus for investors and overseas buyers and there will be a continued interest in mid-market acquisitions and bolt-on deals, as firms look to scale quickly and add specialist capabilities. Private equity investment is anticipated to continue to be active in the sector, with investors favoring businesses with stable income streams. A growing area of importance will be the adoption of AI, driven by government initiatives such as the Made Smarter Programme, which aim to help remove the barrier of digital tech adoption in SMEs within the sector.  

Real estate and construction 

The market entered 2025 with the culmination of the “survive until 2025” mindset. While there have been some elements of distress in the sector, it has been more measured than maybe anticipated. Accordingly, activity for our real estate and construction sector Restructuring team has remained low and steady, and we anticipate this level will continue into 2026, with no spike in distressed activity in sight. 

This steadiness on the distressed side has persisted despite disruptions from geopolitics, tariffs, supply chain and rising costs. Fundraising has proved challenging for equity funds, whereas debt funds have continued to attract capital and deploy it actively, helping support businesses and contain distressed situations. From an asset class perspective, interest remains strong for socio-demographic themes such as data centres, logistics, care homes, and living strategies. 

Our team has continued to work on some of the largest transactions and projects in the market, helping clients polish up their portfolios prior to selling, whether that be reorganisations or audit and tax compliance pitches. Refinancings have also remained a key focus area.  

So what can we expect in 2026? With interest rate now at 3.75%, greater certainty following the autumn budget and US political uncertainty being increasingly viewed as manageable rather than a trigger for market volatility, we anticipate that our clients, and their investors, can cautiously enter 2026 with a more active investment mandate. However, the pricing gap between buyers and sellers is still evident and we feel an element of crystallised distress is potentially still needed to kick start genuine price discovery and accelerate market activity. Clearly it will be interesting to see how this unfolds for all but the GT team is certainly expecting to “be in the mix in 26”