FRANKFURT -(MarketWatch)- There will be about 10 mergers and acquisitions deals this year involving Chinese companies buying a majority in a German company, said a partner at auditing and advisory firm KPMG Tuesday.

The individual transactions will have a deal volume of around EUR50 million, though individual transactions will be bigger, said Moritz Freiherr Schenck, a partner for mergers & acquisitions at KPMG.

He pointed out that the recent four to five transactions seen in the past six months were all of a bigger size and "close to a three-digit-million" euros amount.

Chinese companies' interest in German companies is driven by their interest in technology expertise, and the investment focus will be on manufacturers of industrial goods such as mechanical engineering companies and suppliers to the car industry, Schenck said. Chinese companies are mainly interested in non-listed companies, as an investment in a listed company "is a much more difficult transaction," he said.

Chinese direct investment in Germany --though low in absolute figures-- has recently gained momentum and is expected to pick up further, Schenck said.

At the end of 2009, Chinese companies had invested around EUR629 million in Germany, double the EUR309 million in 2006.