The areas that saw the most M&A activity in the first nine months of 2026 were IT Services, with 37 acquisitions representing 26% of total transaction volume, followed by Enterprise Resource Planning, with 20 deals representing 14% of the total. Industry-specific Applications recorded 15 transactions, accounting for 10% of deal volumes. Other noteworthy subsectors included Internet Content & Commerce and Security with 11 deals each; Business Intelligence, with 9 transactions and Supply Chain Management and Customer Relationship Management which both had 7 deals.