Patrick Brown

There were just 58 transactions in Northern Ireland in the first half of 2020, a 65 per cent decline on the 65 during the same period last year, and Tughans was involved in 19 of them.

Half of all the transactions were funded by private equity, compared with just 22 per cent of deals during the same period last year, with investment favouring the food and drink, tech and healthcare sectors.

Seven of the transactions on which Tughans advised made it into the top ten list for Northern Ireland, including the firm’s work advising BGF on its £10 million investment into Decora Blinds.

Managing partner Patrick Brown said: “While deal volumes are down, the report illustrates that there is still resilience in the market, notably in the food and drink, tech and healthcare sectors in which Tughans has particular expertise.

“These are particularly challenging times and I am very pleased that we continue to perform at the highest levels and maintain our top position as M&A corporate and real estate advisor in the Experian lists.”

James Donnelly, head of corporate, added: “2019 and 2020 will clearly be different years in terms of corporate activity.

The Experian Report shows that the Northern Ireland deal flow has obviously slowed but we would expect the number of funding transactions to increase throughout the remainder of 2020 and we are confident that some of the stalled M&A transactions will come back on track later in the year.”