Activists are eyeing tech stocks ahead of expected M&A rebound after two-year lull
Paul Singer speaking at the Delivering Alpha conference in New York on Sept. 13, 2016.
David A. Grogan | CNBC
Activist investors are circling the tech market.
That’s because, after a two-year plunge in mergers and acquisitions across the industry, there are signs of life to start 2024, with expectations that many more deals are on the way.
For some activists, who take significant stakes in companies often with the ultimate objective of pushing for a sale at a higher price, their campaign efforts can only fully pay off if there’s an active market of buyers. While they can pressure executives to cut costs and improve operations, to profit from their investments, they generally need to see some sort of deal.
An investment banker who advises tech companies told CNBC that his firm is warning clients of a changing environment. The banker, who asked not to be named because he wasn’t authorized to speak on the matter, said his team is telling companies that longer-term activist shareholders are poised to start pushing for breakups or sales, as cost-cutting opportunities diminish.
Tech, media and telecom deal volume peaked at $856 billion in 2021, the year the bull market of more than a decade came to an end. That number dropped to $565 billion in 2022 and plummeted by more than half last year to $255 billion, according to PwC.
Rather than opening their wallets for acquisitions, companies were announcing mass layoffs and other cost cuts, acknowledging that they’d hired too aggressively during the Covid boom. Instead of growth subsidized by the capital markets, tech companies started focusing on operational efficiencies.
Layoffs in the industry jumped about 60% last year, with almost 1,200 companies eliminating more than 262,000 jobs, according to the website Layoffs.fyi.
“A very big portion of these companies are engaging in these layoffs because they are under pressure from an activist behind the scenes,” Sidley Austin shareholder activism and defense co-chair Kai Liekefett told CNBC. “Activists believe that founder-led companies are rarely run efficiently. They think they are run like a frat house.”
While job cuts continue to hit the headlines — January has been the busiest month for layoffs since March — some companies are showing a willingness to start spending big again.
So far this month two mega tech deals have been announced. Semiconductor design and software company Synopsys agreed to acquire Ansys, an engineering and product design software firm, for about $35 billion. And Hewlett Packard Enterprise said it’s buying networking gear vendor Juniper Networks for around $14 billion. Juniper had been targeted by activist hedge fund Elliott Management almost a decade ago.
Also in January, diversified tech company Roper announced its $1.75 billion purchase of software developer Procare Solutions.
Two different activists are pushing Twilio to sell itself or break up, CNBC has previously reported. In January, Piper Sandler analysts floated Adobe or Zoom as potential strategic buyers of Twilio, which has a market cap of over $13 billion.
Salesforce was able to put activist campaigns to bed last year, largely through quick cost-cutting measures. In January 2023, shortly after Elliott was reported to have a multibillion-dollar investment in Salesforce, the company cut 10% of its staff and emphasized a renewed focus on profitability. Salesforce just eliminated another 700 jobs, or about 1% of its workforce, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Activists have shown in the recent past they can push tech companies toward the M&A market.
In October 2022, Starboard Value disclosed a nearly 5% stake in Splunk and called the company a “highly strategic” asset for the right acquirer, specifically noting Cisco’s interest in the company. Less than a year later, Cisco said it would acquire Splunk for $28 billion deal, up from a market cap of about $11.4 billion when news of Starboard’s involvement first surfaced.
Cisco chairman and CEO Chuck Robbins and Splunk CEO Gary Steele on CNBC’S Squawk on the Street.
CNBC
Renewed dealmaking isn’t the only development keeping activists busy.
In 2022, the SEC introduced what’s called the universal proxy card, which lists all director nominees, from both management and shareholders, on one card rather than competing slates.
The rule hasn’t yet had much of an effect, but there are signs that could be changing. At Starbucks, for example, trade union coalition Strategic Organizing Center is angling to secure board seats on a campaign focused on the company’s treatment of workers, the Financial Times reported.
An activist advisor, who requested anonymity in order to speak freely about sensitive matters, said that numerous proxy fights are “in the pipeline,” and that companies may be less willing to hand over control of the board without a battle.
The Sony Group Corp. logo displayed on a screen at the Combined Exhibition of Advanced Technologies (Ceatec) in Chiba, Japan, on Wednesday, Oct. 16, 2024.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Sony Group on Tuesday posted a stronger-than-expected rise in second-quarter operating profit and announced a share buyback of up to 100 billion Japanese yen ($648 million).
Here are Sony’s second-quarter results compared with LSEG SmartEstimates, which are weighted toward forecasts from analysts who are more consistently accurate:
- Revenue: 3.108 trillion Japanese yen ($20.14 billion) vs. 2.985 trillion yen expected
- Operating profit: 429 billion yen vs. 398.44 billion yen expected
Operating profit climbed 10% from a year earlier, while revenues were up 5%. Sony shares jumped more than 6% after the earnings release.
The Japanese technology giant raised its full-year outlook, expecting operating profit to climb by 100 billion yen, or 8% from its previous forecast, led by its imaging and sensing solutions and music segments. The company also lifted its annual revenue projection by 300 billion yen, or 3%, while trimming its estimated losses from U.S. tariffs to 50 billion yen from 70 billion yen.
While Sony has been affected by U.S. President Donald Trump’s global tariff regime launched in April, Tokyo reached a trade deal with Washington in July that lowered duties on Japanese exports to 15% from the 25% initially proposed. The reduced tariffs took effect Aug. 7.
Music and imaging boost
Profit from Sony’s music business increased 27.65% year over year to 115.4 billion yen, while operating profit from its imaging business jumped nearly 50% to 138.3 billion yen, making it the company’s most profitable segment in the quarter.
Sony’s imaging and sensing solutions segment develops and manufactures advanced semiconductor products for a wide range of applications, from smartphones to automotive and industrial systems.
The company also reported strong sales in its game and network services division, which houses its popular PlayStation home console brand. The segment represents Sony’s top revenue driver, but posted a decrease in profits in the September quarter, falling 13.26% to 120.4 billion yen.
Game and network services have performed well in recent quarters thanks to a shift to digital game purchases and the PlayStation Plus subscription service. Growth in hardware shipments has been comparably muted.
KPop Demon Hunters
Despite Sony’s strong earnings showing, profit from its picture business shrank nearly 25% year over year. That was despite Sony Pictures Animation being behind this year’s smash hit production, KPop Demon Hunters, which premiered on June 20.
The film, which was produced by Sony, has reportedly become the most popular Netflix film ever, and continues to break streaming records, even for its original soundtrack.
Despite the success, Sony has missed much of this upside due to selling the film’s exclusive rights to Netflix.
While the exact details of the deal are unknown, it was reported that Sony made an initial $25 million profit from producing the film for Netflix.
Netflix saw K-pop Demon Hunters drive significant viewership and even contributed to its 17% revenue jump in its September quarter.
However, in a bright spot for Sony, a sequel to the movie has already been confirmed, with Netflix reportedly providing the Japanese company a $15 million cash bonus for the first film’s performance.
Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, speaks during the 2025 Annual Shareholder Meeting on Nov. 6, 2025.
Courtesy: Tesla
Tesla shareholders voted last week to give CEO Elon Musk a record pay package, one that could net him about $1 trillion in company stock over the next decade. But Musk received less support than he did for an earlier pay plan in 2018.
Setting aside holdings owned by board members and executives, about 66.9% of shares tabulated in the vote were in favor of the package, according to a filing on Friday. When shareholders voted on the 2018 plan, that number was 73%, according to an analysis by Andrew Droste, head of corporate governance at investment firm Columbia Threadneedle.
In announcing the preliminary results on Thursday at the company’s annual shareholders meeting, Tesla said the plan received 75% support among voting shares. The company count included insiders like Musk, who held around a 15% stake in Tesla going into the proxy and was allowed to vote his shares.
The decline from the prior vote follows a tumultuous stretch for Musk and Tesla. Sales slumped in the first half of the year, in part because of Musk’s inflammatory political rhetoric and his work for the Trump administration, slashing the size of the federal government. Tesla’s brand value has also deteriorated.
Still, Droste said in an email that even at just under 70%, the vote represents “broad support for Elon among Tesla’s shareholder base.” Most investors recognize that Tesla and Elon Musk are “inextricably linked,” he wrote, and were “unwilling to risk his potential departure by allowing this vote to fail.”
Board members recommended shareholders approve the pay plan, which they introduced in September. Top proxy advisors Glass Lewis and ISS had recommended that investors vote against it.
The pay package for Musk, already the world’s richest person, consists of 12 tranches of shares to be granted if Tesla hits certain milestones over the next decade. The first tranche of stock gets paid out if Tesla hits a market capitalization of $2 trillion, about $500 billion more than the current valuation. Awards tied to market cap gains are paired with operational achievements.
Musk could still collect more than $50 billion by hitting a handful of the more attainable goals laid out for him by the board in the new pay plan. There are also a list of “covered events” in the award terms that would allow him to earn his shares without meeting required operational milestones.
Tesla didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Correction: A prior version of this story had an incorrect figure for the vote in support of the pay package.
Michael Intrator, co-founder and CEO of CoreWeave, speaks at the Semafor World Economy Summit during the International Monetary Fund and World Bank Spring meetings in Washington on April 25, 2025.
Kent Nishimura | Bloomberg | Getty Images
CoreWeave, a provider of infrastructure for artificial intelligence companies, reported better-than-expected third-quarter revenue on Monday, but the company delivered disappointing full-year guidance. The stock dropped 6% in extended trading.
Here’s how the company did in comparison with LSEG consensus:
- Earnings: Loss of 22 cents per share
- Revenue: $1.36 billion vs. $1.29 billion expected
Revenue in the quarter soared 134% from $583.9 million a year ago, according to a statement. The company reported a net loss of $110 million, narrowing from about $360 million in the same quarter last year.
CoreWeave’s growth is tied directly to the AI boom, as the company rents out Nvidia graphics processing units and has won business from leading cloud infrastructure providers, including Google and Microsoft. The company’s backlog now stands at $55.6 billion, with 2.9 gigawatts in contracted power, up from 2.2 gigawatts on June 30, according to the statement.
However, CoreWeave now sees 2025 revenue coming in between $5.05 billion and $5.15 billion, trailing the average analyst estimate of $5.29 billion, according to LSEG.
A third-party data center developer is behind schedule, CEO Mike Intrator said on the company’s earnings call. But he added that the delay won’t affect CoreWeave’s backlog.
“There was a problem at one data center that’s impacting us, but there are 32 data centers in our portfolio,” Intrator said.
During the quarter, CoreWeave announced a $6.5 billion expansion of its business with OpenAI and a six-year deal with Meta worth up to $14.2 billion. CoreWeave also received its sixth contract from “a leading hyperscaler.”
The company remains supply-constrained, Intrator said. The shortage is not in power but instead has to do with the availability of partly completed “powered-shell” data centers in which CoreWeave can set up its own equipment, he said.
Meanwhile, CoreWeave is building its own data center infrastructure from the ground up in Pennsylvania, he said.
“The overwhelming majority of the delay that you’re seeing should be taken care of within Q1 of next year.” Intrator said.
CoreWeave went public on the Nasdaq in March, selling shares at $40 each. On Monday the stock closed at $105.61, representing a 164% return. The Nasdaq has gained 32% over a similar period. CoreWeave shares slipped in extended trading on Monday.
Less than four months after its IPO, CoreWeave announced its intent to acquire data center infrastructure operator Core Scientific for $9 billion, but Core Scientific shareholders voted against the proposed deal.
CoreWeave’s 2026 capital expenditures should be “well in excess of double” the total for 2025, which will end up between $12 billion and $14 billion, said Nitin Agrawal, the company’s finance chief.
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