The mergermarket report noted that China had a total of 97 deals worth $6.5 billion, followed by Australia with 40 deals and, India and South Korea each boasting of securing 39 deals from January 2011 until date. Although Malaysia has only nine deals during the period, its value touched $4.66 billion. In terms of value of the deals, Australia stands at the fifth position with deals totaling to $1.97 billion.

Additionally, mergermarket noted that out of the top 10 inbound deals, six were focused on pharmaceuticals and two each in biotechnology and medical technologies space. Among the top 10 deals, Australia had three transactions while Malaysia, Singapore and China had two each during the year. US companies continued to focus on emerging markets by acquiring firms in the Asian region. Japan, which is the second largest pharmaceutical market in the world and has seen single digit growth, also started looking at the Asian region for expansion. Even companies from Canada, the Netherlands, Switzerland and the UK have done transactions during the year. The top 10 deals were in the range of $105 million-to-$1 billion.

In the top 10 outbound deals, Australia stood at the top with four transactions followed by China and Korea with two each and Singapore and Malaysia with one each. Most of these deals happened in the western world mainly in the US and in European nations. With respect to the outbound deals, all deals, except the first two, were worth less than $50 million. Unlike the inbound deals, seven took place in medical technology, two in biotechnology and only one in pharmaceutical area.