The completed deals were across a variety of sectors including technology, technical services and real estate, and involved acquisitive corporate clients including iomart, J&D Wilkie, BPD Zenith and Frasers Group.

Private equity related transactions were also a significant feature, accounting for 60% of the deals completed and involved investors such as Aliter Capital, Inflexion, LDC, HIG Capital, Bridgepoint, Lone Star and Montreux Capital Management. In addition, 30% were cross-border deals and largely related to Scottish businesses expanding internationally.

The UK dealmaking environment remained challenging and relatively sensitive to factors such as macroeconomic challenges, pre-election uncertainty and the prospect of a hike in tax rates in the new Government’s first budget in October. Despite this uncertain and at times volatile backdrop, BDO saw continued resilience in the Scottish deals market.

There was continued M&A appetite from private equity investors and their portfolio companies, as well as strategic growth from businesses executing buy and build strategies to achieve scale and gain market share. Private equity and corporate acquirers still have significant capital to deploy in the year ahead.

BDO was involved in a wide range of private equity deals, including advising the shareholders of Condatis on securing investment from Bridgepoint, working with Aliter Capital on its investment in BBS Law, supporting iomart on its acquisition of Atech (providing an exit for Pelican Capital) and advising Biffa on its acquisition of Keenan Recycling (providing an exit for BGF).

Craig Martin, deal advisory partner at BDO, said: “2024 was another challenging year for dealmaking in Scotland, however, many of our clients took the opportunity to create value by pursuing national and international growth strategies.

“We also worked with opportunistic investors capitalising on the value available in subdued segments of the real estate market.

“Looking ahead, our pipeline of deals remains strong across a number of sectors including technology, real estate and business services. We anticipate that the greater degree of certainty will drive private equity and corporate deal activity across Scotland. We expect a steady stream of deal completions in the first quarter of 2025.”

Rory McPherson, deal advisory partner at BDO, added: “Despite several competing factors and an increased pressure on costs, there is a sense of optimism for 2025.

“M&A activity will be triggered by a desire to consolidate, particularly in those markets that remain fragmented, such as IT and managed services, technical services and business services. Sectors such as tech and circular economy businesses remain attractive to investors and buyers, so we’d expect continued volumes and values in this space.”

BDO LLP has also been ranked as the number one financial due diligence provider in the UK and Ireland in Mergermarket’s Accounting League Table for 2024. In the same week, the firm has been named the most active adviser in 2024 by Factset.

Derek Neil, BDO partner and head of transaction services, added: “In an increasingly complex world, we’re proud to have earned the position of top financial due diligence provider in 2024. We’ve supported our clients to complete 266 transactions, providing financial due diligence on 217 of these.

“This achievement reflects our clients’ trust in us to help them to navigate complex decisions, as well as our talented team’s ability to deliver meaningful insights.”