M&A Deal Tracker: Sectors insulated from COVID-19 may attract large transactions, says Grant Thornton

The acquisition of Netmeds by Reliance Industries' retail arm is the latest in a long line of deals the conglomerate has been involved in over the past few months.

In July, deals worth $4.8 billion were sealed by Jio Platforms, while Reliance Industries struck a $1 billion deal for a joint venture with BP in fuel retail. Consultancy firm Grant Thornton said that these deals would make up for over 70 percent of the total value recorded in July.

These deals record the highest deal activity for 2020 during the past month. However, without these deals by Reliance entities, there was a 15 percent decline in deal values compared to July 2019, and only a 14 percent growth from levels recorded in June 2020.

Private equity players have also been more active in July this year. However the lack of big-ticket deals has meant that while deal volumes may be a little higher, deal values are lower than both June of this year and July of last year. Again, Brookfield's $3.6 billion investment in Jio Platforms formed a major chunk of the deals driven by private equity firms.

So what kind of visibility is there in the Indian M&A pipeline? Is outbound M&A likely to pick up as the economy gets back on its feet? Is the trend showing increasing private equity activity likely to sustain? To discuss these questions, CNBC-TV18's Shereen Bhan gets in conversation with Pankaj Chopda, Executive Director at Grant Thornton LLP.

RIL, the promoter of Reliance Jio, also controls Network18, the parent company of CNBCTV18.com.