The BUBBLE came to Israel too, with a record $4.2 billion in exits, averaging $83 million. While there were IPOs (notably Wix in November), most of the acquisitions were made by global technology companies with R&D Centers (and their corporate M&A teams) in Israel, including Apple, Google, EMC, AOL, Cisco, IBM and now Facebook.
Groucho Marx could have been talking about the Israeli hi-tech sector when he said “I made a killing on Wall Street a few years ago…I shot my broker”. In 2012, as Israeli exits topped $5.5 billion, there was reason to celebrate but plenty of cause for concern.
Traditional media companies had an amazing year on Wall Street. While the Dow Jones Index increased a respectable 6.7%, the US Broadcasting and Entertainment Index surged 40%. In fact, other than Sony (dragged down by its hardware business), 6 of the top 7 media conglomerates substantially outperformed the NASDAQ 500.
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