Private Equity Spotlight

This episode is sponsored by AlixPartners

The Disruption Matters special podcast miniseries has returned for its fifth season, and this year, our focus is on providing an ‘Exit Playbook’, wherein leading industry experts share their advice on how to generate successful exits during a climate defined by their scarcity. In this fourth episode of the season, we look at timing.

This is a six-part miniseries, and we’ll be releasing a new episode here on Private Equity Spotlight every week. But if you’d rather not wait, you can listen to the whole series right now. Just click this link – if you already have a Private Equity International account, simply sign in, or register for free to access all six episodes.

In a perfect world, a portfolio company would perform so brilliantly that the buyers would show up unprompted. But managers live in the real world, so they need to consider several “trigger points” that would support launching an exit process. Naturally, performance is key, but it’s also performance that substantiates the sales story. The company may need time to develop that story so it can educate the market on what they’ve accomplished and why there’s even more value to unlock, because no one is looking to pay top dollar for an enterprise whose best days are in the rearview mirror.

Guests include: Alex Greenbaum, partner and head of active core infrastructure at EQT; Chris Taber, partner and managing director at AlixPartners; Jerome Losson, partner and head of portfolio operations at Ambienta; Matteo Stefanel, managing partner and co-founder of Apis Partners; Lane McDonald, managing director for operations & strategy at OMERS Private Equity; Alexis Underwood, partner at Wynnchurch; Megha Kalsi, partner on the cyber team at AlixPartners; Maurizio Mussi, partner and head of portfolio group, Europe, at Bain Capital; Doron Grosman, former CEO and operating partner; Mike Hollander, managing director at GTCR; Helen Lee Bouygues, operating partner at Ardian; Riccardo Basile, operating partner and head of value creation at Permira; Neil Kalvelage, senior managing director and head of portfolio operations at Centerbridge; Brian Cassidy, president of Crestview; Adrian Letts, managing partner and head of business operations at Brookfield PE; Fahim Ahmed, COO of BC Partners; Jason McDannold, co-lead of the Americas private equity practice at AlixPartners; and Stuart Walker, partner at Cinven.

This episode is sponsored by AlixPartners

The Disruption Matters special podcast miniseries has returned for its fifth season, and this year, our focus is on providing an ‘Exit Playbook’, wherein leading industry experts share their advice on how to generate successful exits during a climate defined by their scarcity.

This is a six-part miniseries, and we’ll be releasing a new episode here on Private Equity Spotlight every week. But if you’d rather not wait, you can listen to the whole series right now. Just click this link – if you already have a Private Equity International account, simply sign in, or register for free to access all six episodes.

In this third episode of the season, our guests make the case that any investment case needs to be tied to the likeliest exit scenarios. Not all value creation efforts are created equal in the eyes of the buyer, so the journey to exit needs to be supporting the story the seller hopes to pitch the market. This also means taking a hard look at the current management teams and the IT solutions to ensure the company is built to grow and sustain that performance. And that’s best done as early as possible.

Guests include: Jerome Losson, partner and head of portfolio operations at Ambienta; Matteo Stefanel, managing partner and co-founder of Apis Partners; Saurabh Singh, partner at AlixPartners; Alexis Underwood, partner at Wynnchurch; Chris Satchell, head of portfolio tech at CD&R; Megha Kalsi, partner on the cyber team at AlixPartners; Maurizio Mussi, partner and head of portfolio group, Europe, at Bain Capital; Helen Lee Bouygues, operating partner at Ardian; Doron Grosman, former CEO and operating partner; Riccardo Basile, operating partner and head of value creation at Permira; Neil Kalvelage, senior managing director and head of portfolio operations at Centerbridge; Brian Cassidy, president of Crestview; Jason McDannold, co-lead of the Americas private equity practice at AlixPartners; and Adrian Letts, managing partner and head of business operations at Brookfield PE.

This episode is sponsored by AlixPartners

The Disruption Matters special podcast miniseries has returned for its fifth season, and this year, our focus is on providing an ‘Exit Playbook’, wherein leading industry experts share their advice on how to generate successful exits during a climate defined by their scarcity.

This is a six-part miniseries, and we’ll be releasing a new episode here on Private Equity Spotlight every week. But if you’d rather not wait, you can listen to the whole series right now. Just click this link – if you already have a Private Equity International account, simply sign in, or register for free to access all six episodes.

In this second episode of the season, we explore how to keep the buyer’s point of view at the center of the transaction, from initial due diligence to crossing the t’s on the final sale documents. We discuss the need to make sure the value creation efforts are building the kind of company the next buyer wants. This involves building long-term relationships with interested parties to stay abreast of their priorities and reservations, as well as ensuring the story is one that resonates and is backed up by the actual performance of the company. And we end on the one secret ingredient that can’t be discounted in negotiations with that buyer.

Guests on this episode include: Mike Hollander, managing director at GTCR; Alex Greenbaum, partner and head of active core infrastructure at EQT; Alexis Underwood, partner at Wynnchurch; Doron Grossman, former CEO and operating partner; Neil Kalvelage, senior managing director and head of portfolio operations at Centerbridge; Chris Taber, partner and managing director at AlixPartners; Lane McDonald, managing director for operations & strategy at OMERS Private Equity; Riccardo Basile, operating partner and head of value creation at  Permira; Jerome Losson, partner and head of portfolio operations at Ambienta; Megha Kalsi, partner on the cyber team at AlixPartners; Chris Satchell, head of portfolio tech at CD&R; Jason McDannold, co-lead of the Americas private equity practice at AlixPartners; and Matteo Stefanel, managing partner and co-founder of Apis Partners.

Clear succession plans, steadily growing fund sizes, realistic marks and genuinely effective operating partners are among the things LPs need to see from a GP before making an allocation in the current environment.

That’s according to Young Lee, a managing director at New York-headquartered fund-of-funds manager Abbott Capital, speaking on the latest episode of PEI Group’s Commitment Issues podcast series. The episode, hosted by PEI’s Chris Witkowsky, addressed the perennial topic of private equity fundraising, with Lee noting that from an LP’s perspective, “almost always a bigger fund size is bad”.

“We would love the same thing every time, people still being happy even though they’re making the same amount of money,” he said. “[Because] what we’re looking for really is whether the GP is staying in their strategy.”

Jack Purcell, a managing partner at Charlotte, North Carolina-based Ridgemont Equity Partners, countered that “some growth is a sign of progress” for GPs. Not only does a bigger fund size “communicate progress and the vibrancy of the partnership externally to investors and other counterparties”, he suggested, but “the ability to have a critical mass of assets under management and fee income to invest” matters too.

Meanwhile, on the topic of value creation, Lee warned that while “a lot of LPs focus a lot on the operations side and often value the partners who have operating experience”, this can sometimes equate to “smoke and mirrors”, where “either they’re not effective people or GPs aren’t using them effectively”.

Finally, Purcell and Lee agreed on the urgent need for more detailed succession planning at the GP level. “The amazing thing to me is that, for an industry comprised of really competitive, really smart, Type-A people who plan everything – plan their day, plan their hour, plan the minute – to not have a plan is almost comical,” Purcell said.

The views, opinions, and statements expressed by the individuals in this episode are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions or official positions of their firms or their affiliates. Nothing in this episode should be construed as investment, legal or tax advice, or as an offer or solicitation to invest in any fund or vehicle managed by the firms or any other party. Statements regarding past performance are not indicative of future results.

This episode is sponsored by Troutman Pepper Locke and Withum

Managers face an increasing set of expectations and obligations as the fees and expenses landscape continues to evolve. According to Private Funds CFO’s Fees & Expenses Survey 2026, conducted in partnership with advisory and accounting firm Withum and law firm Troutman Pepper Locke, nearly 80 percent of respondents reported that they experienced moderate to heavy scrutiny during their last SEC exam. These respondents were drawn from 132 US alternative asset managers.

Investors are also taking a keen interest in cost allocation and disclosure practices. With structures such as continuation vehicles growing in popularity, its raising questions around the ambiguity of fund documentation, with many LPAs devised before these entities went mainstream. When faced with fees and expenses allocation questions not addressed in the documentation, managers are generally favouring a conservative response, with nearly two-thirds of respondents consulting with outside counsel.

Moreover, the survey looks at how managers are preparing for an influx of retail capital, as well as examining the impact of AI on management fees.

So, what does the push for greater transparency mean for managers? To unpack this further, PEI’s senior content producer, Evie Rusman, is joined in this episode by Colleen Fay, financial services practice leader at Withum; Theodore Edwards, a partner at Troutman Pepper Locke; and Bill Myers, Washington correspondent for Private Funds CFO. Together, they analyse the survey data and discuss how regulatory activity and market forces could reshape the industry going forward.

This is the fifth episode in PEI Group’s Data Dive miniseries, where we dig into our proprietary data, surveys and rankings, as well as recent market data sets, to understand what investors and fund managers are thinking, and how private markets are evolving. Listen to previous episodes here.

This year's Global Investor 150 – Private Equity International's annual ranking of the largest private equity LPs in the world based on the fair market value of their PE investment portfolios – reveals a total of $2.88 trillion was allocated to the asset class by the featured investors as of end-December 2025. This represents an increase of almost 9 percent on the previous year.

Investors appeared to prioritise long-term strategy over short-term market conditions, maintaining confidence in private equity despite a challenging fundraising and exit environment. Rather than stepping back from the asset class, many are refining how they deploy capital, with greater interest in the mid-market and increasingly sophisticated portfolio construction strategies.

PEI Group’s senior content producer Evie Rusman was joined by Carmela Mendoza and Katrina Lau, both senior reporters at PEI, to break down the findings and explore what this signals about the private equity landscape.

This is the fourth episode in PEI Group’s new Data Dive miniseries, where we dig into our proprietary data, surveys and rankings, as well as recent market data sets, to understand what investors and fund managers are thinking, where capital is moving and how the asset class is evolving.

Stay tuned for the next episode, which will provide insight into affiliate title Private Funds CFO’s Fees and Expenses 2026 Survey.

In the world of European venture capital, very few names carry the same weight as Dame Anne Glover. She co-founded Amadeus Capital Partners in 1997 when the idea of a dedicated British deep-tech investment firm was, by most accounts, a little eccentric.

London–headquartered Amadeus has backed more than 200 companies over its almost three-decade-long history. Glover herself has chaired both the UK and European private capital associations and this year was awarded a DBE – one of the highest honours in the British system – for outstanding contributions to science and engineering.

In this episode, we sit in on a live conversation – recorded at PEI Group’s London headquarters for a PEI Presents discussion – between Dame Anne Glover and senior editor Adam Le. Topics include: the persistent gap in the UK's funding ladder, the untapped potential of British defined contribution pension schemes, what the AI boom means for investors, and the "SaaSpocalypse."

Defence investing has been one of the hottest topics in European private equity over the past year. Firms including Warburg Pincus, PEI Group owner Bridgepoint, Carlyle Group and Tikehau Capital have all launched strategies or are mulling them, while LPs such as AkademikerPension, PensionDanmark, M&G Investments, PenSam and Finnish pension insurer Varma have either already invested in PE defence strategies or are considering doing so.

In this episode, senior editor Adam Le sits down with EMEA editor for investor intelligence Joe Marsh to delve into the types of strategies LPs are looking for in the defence arena; the challenges that come with exiting defence assets; the role that ESG plays in LPs' investment policies; and why the themes of security, sovereignty and resilience are increasingly on investors' minds.

Find all Private Equity International's defence-related coverage here.

This year’s PEI 300 – our annual ranking of the five‑year fundraising totals of the world’s largest private equity firms – shows fundraising returning to near‑normal levels after a muted 2025. Capital raised hit a record $3.55 trillion, an 8 percent increase on last year, compared with just 0.37 percent growth in 2025.

Technology managers faced a tougher environment, with several slipping down the ranking. Meanwhile, private wealth continues to gain momentum as more firms prioritise it as a source of capital.

To unpack what this means for the industry, PEI Group’s senior content producer Evie Rusman is joined by Adam Le, senior editor for private equity, and Kristina Savcenkova, research manager. Together, they break down the numbers and explore what they signal about the evolving private equity landscape.

This is the third episode in Private Equity International’s new Data Dive miniseries, where we dig into our proprietary data, surveys and rankings, as well as recent market data sets, to understand what investors and fund managers are thinking, where capital is moving and how the asset class is evolving.

Listen to previous episodes here and stay tuned for upcoming episodes, which will provide insight into affiliate title Private Funds CFO’s Fees and Expenses Survey 2026 and the 2026 edition of PEI’s Global Investor 150 ranking.

This episode is sponsored by AlixPartners

The Disruption Matters special podcast miniseries is returning for its fifth season, and this year, leading industry experts will share their advice on how to generate successful exits during a climate defined by their scarcity.

In this teaser episode, we set the stage by exploring all the factors that make exits so elusive right now. We’ll be discussing both the forces GPs can control, and those they can’t – from broader market conditions to decisions around talent, tech and value creation. The good news is that there is a playbook to address the headwinds. The bad news is that it leaves little margin for error and requires unwavering focus, creativity and discipline.

In this episode: