NEW YORK, Nov. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- The Deal, a
business unit of TheStreet (NASDAQ: TST), will announce
the winners of its 10th Annual Most Admired
Corporate Dealmakers (MACD) Awards today. The presentation will
take place during The Deal Economy Conference at the JW
Marriott Essex House in New York.
"This year's competition was exceptionally close," said
Jeff Davis, President of The Deal,
"because in all industry sectors considered, executives appear to
have made the right decisions to address the challenges facing
their firms. On behalf of The Deal, congratulations to the best of
the best."
By sector, the 2017 MACD winners are:
ENERGY: Parsley Energy (PE) may or may not have
made the best deals in the energy patch over the past year, but no
one can argue the company's founder and CEO Bryan Sheffield didn't time them pretty well.
The billionaire oil executive has about 230,000 acres in arguably
the hottest resource play in the world under his control, and for
the last roughly 80,000 acres or so, his company shelled out very
little cash and added relatively little debt.
TELECOM: While AT&T has undoubtedly made the biggest
splash with the acquisition of Time Warner, T-Mobile
USA (TMUS) us arguably in the
best strategic position in telecom. The company spent $8 billion on wireless spectrum this year to
bolster its network as it poaches customers from AT&T and
Verizon.
MEDIA: For more than 30 years, Sinclair Broadcast
Group (SBGI) executive chairman David
Smith acquired dozens of TV stations, concentrating on small
markets while capitalizing on federal rules allowing companies to
own or operate multiple stations in the same market. In May,
Sinclair won agreement for a very different kind of deal:
the proposed acquisition of Tribune Media Co. and the
opportunity to enter much bigger markets and strengthen its ability
to negotiate fees with pay-TV operators.
TECHNOLOGY: Cloud app and infrastructure adoption has put
old-guard enterprise IT giants such as Hewlett-Packard
Enterprise (HPE) in a tough spot. HPE's response has been
to shed a large portion of its struggling software and services
businesses, and use acquisitions to expand into still-growing
hardware markets. There's something to be said for trying to stand
out in one realm rather than trying to be everything to
everyone.
RETAIL: PE firm Sycamore Partners acquired struggling
office supply retailer Staples Inc. (SPLS) in June. The
transaction is a win for Staples, as its former proposed merger
with rival Office Depot Inc. was blocked on anti-trust concerns the
year before. Sycamore, a retail specialist, will hopefully be able
to improve Staples' dwindling sales and store traffic.
CONSUMER: A month after Amazon's (AMZN)
$13.7 billion deal for Whole Foods
Market, investors still aren't clear on the Internet giant's
strategy, but what's not in doubt is that the deal will prove
transformative to retail and grocery. And while Jeff Bezos has no food retail experience, he
also lacked experience in book selling, mass retailing, cloud
computing, logistics and television production, areas the company
now dominates.
FINANCIAL SERVICES: With its purchase of Capital Bank
Financial Corp., First Horizon National Corp (FHN) will gain
greater access to the North
Carolina markets of Raleigh, Greensboro and Charlotte, and offer an opportunity to add
deposit customers in Florida. The
combined company will be the fourth largest bank in the Southeast,
with $40 billion in assets.
HEALTHCARE: In April, Becton, Dickinson & Co.
(BDX) unveiled the biggest deal in its 120-year history, the
$24 billion acquisition of medical
technology peer C.R. Bard Inc. The transaction "makes
financial sense (even at a premium valuation), and strategically
makes BD an even stronger hospital supply company," according to
William Blair & Co. analyst
Brian Weinstein.
INDUSTRIALS: WestRock Co.'s (WRK) chief executive
Steven C. Voorhees gets the nod not
for any single mesmerizing transaction, but for tying strategic
M&A into its efforts to streamlining its diverse portfolio.
WestRock announced its acquisition of Multi Packaging Solutions
International Ltd. (MPSX) – its biggest deal in its two-year
existence – just one week after agreeing to sell its specialty
dispenser business to Silgan Holdings Inc. (SLGN).
The MACD awards process starts with The Deal's newsroom
scrutinizing the 10 biggest transactions of 2017 in each of nine
sectors. Reporters then interviews analysts, bankers and other
experts to determine the five nominees behind those deals -
and others - that are considered the most significant and
potentially successful in terms of strategic vision and shareholder
returns. Winners were chosen by a panel of top Deal editors, based
on a simple majority vote.
To watch the live stream of The Deal Economy Conference
including The Most Admired Corporate Dealmaker awards
presentation, click here.
The conference is produced by The Deal and BoardEx, and
presented in collaboration with Ansarda, EY, Pepper Hamilton,
Latham & Watkins, Morrison & Foerster, Bain & Company,
Okapi Partners, Donnelley Financial Solutions, ACA Aponix,
Nelson Mullins, and Workshare.
About The Deal
The Deal (www.thedeal.com)
provides actionable, intraday coverage of mergers, acquisitions and
all other changes in corporate control to institutional investors,
private equity, hedge funds and the firms that serve them. The Deal
is a business unit of TheStreet, Inc. (NASDAQ:
TST, www.t.st), a leading financial news and information
provider. Other business units
include TheStreet (www.thestreet.com), an unbiased source
of business news and market analysis for investors; BoardEx
(www.boardex.com), a relationship mapping service of corporate
directors and officers; and RateWatch (www.rate-watch.com), which
supplies rate and fee data from banks and credit unions across
the U.S.
Contact: Jon Kostakopoulos,
212-321-5561, Jon.Kostakopoulos at thestreet.com
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