Apollo hired three managing directors. Carlyle supplied one of them.
Apollo hired three managing directors, one of them from Carlyle. Advent's head of tech strategy now works at the OpenAI venture Advent helped fund.
Latest
Advent sold its last CCC shares at $7.79. GTCR will pay $7.75.
GTCR and Elliott are paying $7.75 a share for CCC. Advent sold its final stake last November at $7.79, down from a $10 SPAC-era price.
Thoma Bravo's Proofpoint pays 53 times free cash flow for Varonis
Proofpoint will pay $49.75 a share for Varonis, 52% above the June close. The multiple is 53 times free cash flow, and the first-half cash flow fell.
EQT's fee-generating assets rose €40bn in a quarter. Coller was €34bn.
Fee-generating assets rose €40bn in the quarter. Strip out the Coller acquisition and the gain is about €6bn.
Two buyout veterans have launched a national security private equity firm
Watch Point Capital has a one-page website and two founders from Madison Dearborn and Platinum Equity. Here is what we can say about the new defence-focused firm.
GP financing, explained. How managers borrow against fees and carry, and why it is so hard to find below $30m
GP financing is a loan or preferred instrument provided at the manager level, to the general partner, the management company or a sponsor affiliate, rather than to the fund. It is secured on what those entities and their owners actually hold, which means equity in the management company, the right
If I were running AI diligence on a PE portfolio right now, I would not ask "are you using AI?"
I would ask which level of the spectrum you are actually on. Because most portcos think they are a 4. They are a 2. And the gap between those two numbers is where the write-down lives. I have sat in enough board meetings where the CEO confidently describes their
If I were building a PE operating model from scratch, I wouldn't start with a value creation plan.
I'd start by killing the theatre. Most operating models are built backwards. There's an ops team that is really a reporting team. There's a "value creation" function that is one person, a recycled PowerPoint, and a heroic ability to say "cross-
“Show me the distributions” is a wonderfully efficient way to shorten an LP presentation.
Saves everyone forty slides on why the portfolio is performing magnificently despite the absence of any money. The valuations are robust. The assets are exceptional. The exit pipeline is encouraging. Lovely. The pensioners have asked whether they can spend the appendix. Private equity gets paid to be patient. Fair enough.
LP meetings have become theatre with better catering.
A lot of LP meetings are no longer really about communication. They are about stage management. The deck is polished. The messaging is tight. The bad news has been moved three clicks deeper into the appendix. The winners get a cinematic retelling. The problems get translated into phrases like timing,
PE conferences are broken. Their floor plans tell you quite a lot about the attitude behind them.
“Value creation” gets top billing on the main stage. Operating partners get a separate room, a different floor, sometimes an entirely separate event. The industry has managed to make the people responsible for delivering the investment thesis a fringe attraction. Quite an achievement. And giving operating partners their own conference
AE Industrial lost two partners in one week, both to operating seats.
AE Industrial lost two partners to company jobs. Everyone else was hiring operators. Senior moves at the 200 largest US PE firms, week to 13 October.
Theses
3x Thesis: The “Revenue Recovery” Platform for Healthcare Providers
Every healthcare investor knows the story: the clinic looks profitable on paper, but when you lift the hood, there’s 10–15% of revenue sitting in limbo...unpaid claims, coding errors, rejected reimbursements. It’s not a demand problem. It’s a billing problem. The U.S. healthcare system processes
Theses
3x Thesis: The Municipal Services Modernisation Play
Most local governments still run on software that looks like it came free with Windows XP. Procurement, permits, inspections, citizen support portals......held together by outdated code, clunky interfaces, and people who've been "restarting the server" since 2004. Yet these systems handle billions in transactions and
Theses
3x Thesis: Kids Are the New Luxury
Luxury is no longer worn. It’s scheduled. The modern affluent parent isn’t showing off with a Rolex.....they’re flexing through weekend fencing tournaments, bilingual tutoring, and elite chess camps. We’re witnessing the rise of child-focused conspicuous consumption. And the numbers are massive: According to the
Theses
3x Thesis: The Trade School Flywheel
One of the most underutilised value creation strategies in PE right now. Buy the education platform. Buy the service companies. Place the grads. Repeat. Think about it: if you’re investing in HVAC, plumbing, electrical, auto repair....any business reliant on skilled labour.....then you already know the bottleneck isn’
Theses
3x Thesis: The Great American Garage Conversion Play
America’s housing crisis isn’t creeping up on us. It’s already here and the math doesn’t work. Home prices are up 40% in four years. Mortgage rates have doubled. And nearly half of renters now spend over 30% of their income on housing. Meanwhile, the country is
Theses
3x Thesis: The Divorce Industrial Complex Needs a Digital Exit
Most people still treat divorce like a one-off legal event. But it’s not. It’s an industry. A massive one. And it’s ripe for a platform play. $50B+ is spent every year in the US alone across legal fees, mediation, financial restructuring, therapy, custody planning, moving house,
Theses
3x Thesis: The pet industry is begging for a platform.
Not another subscription treat box. Not another tele-vet point solution. A true platform, vertically integrated, brand-led, and built around the modern pet parent. Vet tech. Grooming. Supplements. Home delivery. Bundled into one membership, one app, one trusted brand. 1. Pet ownership is booming, but the experience is broken.
Theses
3x Thesis: If you’re building a med spa platform today, don’t invest in real estate, invest in distribution.
The aesthetics industry loves talking about location like it’s gospel. “Affluent ZIP code.” “High visibility.” “Street-front retail.” However, the best med spa location might be someone else’s. Here’s the 3x thesis behind why hotel and gym partnerships on a rev-share model are one of the
Theses
3x Thesis: Insurance-Adjacent Services- Home warranties, inspections, and mitigation as an investment platform.
Buying a home services business? Still a smart play. You get: – Non-discretionary demand – Fragmented competition – Predictable cash flows – And plenty of exit paths (especially if you stack a few trades together) But here’s a better question PE firms should ask: What if instead of owning a service company.
Theses
3x Thesis: Digitizing the Funeral Industry
Morbid margins, minimal tech, and a $100B generational wealth transfer. The funeral industry is one of the last remaining consumer sectors untouched by modern technology. It’s awkward, analog, and full of friction. And that’s exactly what makes it interesting. Let’s start with the basics: the average cost
Theses
3x Thesis: The “Blue-Collar SaaS” Rollup
Everyone’s chasing the next vertical SaaS winner in finance, healthcare, or HR. Meanwhile, the trades are quietly becoming one of the best software rollup opportunities out there. What I call “Blue-Collar SaaS”.........job schedulers, quoting tools, dispatch systems, customer communications platforms, CRMs for trades. Plumbing, HVAC, electrical, roofing,
Theses
3x Thesis: The “Hyperlocal Lead Gen Arbitrage” play is still dramatically underpriced and underutilized.
Take Pinnacle Home Services, backed by Trivest. They’ve been rolling up HVAC, plumbing, and electrical companies across the Southeast, and doing something smart that most folks miss: They centralized marketing. Instead of letting each acquired business keep its old-school mix of direct mail, print, and the occasional Facebook