Seeking growth capital, eyeing a software exit, or exploring Europe’s private equity scene? This article is your go-to guide!
In this article, we delve into the most active private equity investors in the software space, providing a detailed summary of their geographical focus, investment criteria, exit horizon, and geographical presence. Private equity firms are increasingly investing in software companies for their significant growth potential, recurring revenues, robust margins, and efficient capital utilization. They prioritize businesses with established revenue streams and loyal customer bases—perhaps your business fits the bill?
For this analysis, we define software companies based on the Mergermarket classification, which includes application software, software development, system integrations, and operating systems. Our dataset includes approximately 13,000 announced software investments made by 3,092 financial investors across all stages of the company lifecycle. In this article we highlight the top 10 software private equity firms in Europe, ranked by deal activity from 2014 to today (April, 2025). Our research covers investments ranging from growth investments to buyout deals, with double digit equity stakes all the way to 100% buyouts.
Software investments by private equity firms in Europe between 2014 and April 2025
According to league tables, the top five private equity firms collectively account for 5.2% of all investments in European software companies. Hg leads this group with 195 investments during the observed period. *Note that the add-on acquisitions made by the portfolio companies of the PE funds are included in the totals.
Overview of the top 10 software private equity investment firms in Europe, measured by deal volume
Accel, SpeedInvest, and Balderton Capital were omitted because of their venture capital profile and replaced by the next most active funds, including Silver Lake, Hellman & Friedman, and Vista Equity Partners.
Detailed profile of the top 10 most active PE firms investing in Software
1) Hg
Overview: Hg is a private equity firm specializing in buyouts and growth equity for established companies. Since 2012, they focus exclusively on B2B software and services across sectors such as healthcare, industrials, telecom, media, and others.
Geographic Focus: Primarily North America and Europe, with a strong emphasis on the UK, USA, Nordic region, and Germany.
Investment Criteria:
- Equity Ticket: Typically above €100 million
- Enterprise Value: Typically €100 million and above
- Stake: Considers majority or minority stakes
- Board Representation: Seeks board seats in portfolio companies
Key Offices: London, Munich, Paris, San Francisco, and New York
2) Main Capital Partners
Overview: Main Capital Partners B.V. is a private equity firm based in the Netherlands, specializing in growth capital, middle market transactions, and special situations such as turnarounds and secondary buyouts. The firm focuses on enterprise software, SaaS, media, and technology sectors.
Geographic Focus: Main Capital Partners primarily invests in companies based in the Benelux (Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg), Nordic region, and DACH region (Germany, Austria, Switzerland).
Investment Criteria:
- Equity Ticket: Between €5 million and €150 million per transaction
- Enterprise Values: Unspecified
- Revenue: Between €3 million and €100 million
- Stake: Prefers majority stakes
- Exit Horizon: Typically three to six years
Key Offices: The Hague, with additional offices in Belgium, Düsseldorf, Stockholm, and Amsterdam
3) Insight Partners
Overview: Insight Partners is a venture capital, private equity, and growth equity firm investing in expansion capital, growth equity and buyouts. It primarily targets the technology sector, including consumer-facing tech, e-commerce, internet, mobile, SaaS, infrastructure software, B2B commerce, post-secondary education, and data-enabled services.
Geographic Focus: Global
Investment Criteria:
- Equity Ticket: $3 million to $500 million per transaction
- Deal Sizes: Varies widely
- Stake: Majority and minority investments, primary and secondary shares, co-investments
- Board Representation: Seeks board seats in portfolio companies
Key Offices: New York, with additional offices in Europe, Asia, North America, and South America
4) TA Associates
Overview: TA Associates is a private equity and venture capital firm specializing in a wide range of investments, including equity, minority recapitalizations, and leveraged recapitalizations. The firm focuses on mid-market and mature companies across various sectors globally, with a significant emphasis on investing in tech companies.
Geographic Focus: Global, with a focus on North America (USA), Europe, Asia (India, Greater China, Korea), Scandinavia, and other emerging markets.
Investment Criteria:
- Equity Ticket: $5 million to $600 million in equity per transaction
- Enterprise Value: $50 million to $5 billion
- Stake: Majority or minority positions, without operating control. Seeks board seats or board-level advisor roles
- Board Representation: Seeks board seats or board-level advisor roles
Key Offices: Boston, Massachusetts (headquarters); Austin, Texas; Menlo Park, California; Mumbai, India; Central, Hong Kong; London, United Kingdom
5) Eurazeo
Overview: Eurazeo is a private equity and venture capital firm specializing in growth capital, acquisitions, leveraged buyouts, and buy-ins of private companies. The firm invests in both mid-market and listed public companies, targeting medium-sized or large companies, SMEs, high-growth companies, and real estate management and investment activities.
Geographic Focus: Primarily invests in the United States, France, Italy, North America, and other European countries.
Investment Criteria:
- Equity Ticket: €50 million to €250 million in small-mid buyouts; €25 million to €100 million in growth businesses; €10 million to €40 million in healthcare research; $1.17 million to $600 million overall
- Enterprise Value: Typically less than €150/200 million
- Stake: Prefers majority stakes but also takes minority positions
- Board Representation: Seeks active involvement through board seats
- Revenue Range: Targets businesses in the lower middle market, typically between $30 million and $300 million in revenue
Sector Focus: While sector-agnostic, Eurazeo prefers investing in smart cities, services, leisure and mobility, real estate, fintech, distribution, industry, luxury, consumer goods, business services, and health. Eurazeo also invests in tech companies within the smart cities and fintech sectors.
Key Offices: Headquartered in Paris, France, with additional offices in North America, Asia, Europe, and South America
6) Elvaston Capital Management
Overview: Elvaston Capital Management is a private equity firm specializing in management buy-outs, management buy-ins, industry consolidation, restructuring, special situations, and growth capital investments. The firm typically engages in 3-5 add-on acquisitions per investment.
Geographic Focus: Primarily invests in Austria, Germany, and Switzerland.
Investment Criteria:
- Equity Ticket: $10 to $50 million in equity per transactions
- Revenue: Targets companies with annual revenue between €10 million and €100 million
- Stake: Prefers majority and minority stakes in its portfolio companies
- Sector Focus: Primarily invests in the technology sector, specifically enterprise software. Elvaston Capital Management has a strong focus on tech companies, particularly within the enterprise software sector
Key Offices: Headquartered in Berlin, Germany, with an additional office in London, United Kingdom
7) Verdane
Overview: Verdane is a private investment firm specializing in direct investments and secondary direct investments, focusing on supporting and growing businesses. The firm engages in buyouts, growth capital, and investments in other funds. It targets growth, seed/start-ups, early venture, mid-venture, late venture, emerging growth, spin-offs, and turnarounds in middle market, mature smaller stage, and medium-sized companies.
Geographic Focus: Primarily invests in the Nordic region (Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland) and prefers Central and Northern Europe.
Investment Criteria:
- Equity Ticket: Typically €1 million to €50 million, but can invest above €150 million
- Revenue: Targets companies with revenues between SEK 50 million and SEK 500 million
- Stake: Prefers minority stakes but also takes majority stakes, often seeking board representation and control investments
Sector Focus: Invests in IT, energy technology, resource efficiency, financial services, internet retail, fintech, consumer internet, ICT, e-commerce, telecommunications services, media, technology hardware, advanced industrial technology, oil and gas, biotechnology, and enterprise software. Verdane specifically targets tech companies within the IT and e-commerce sectors.
Key Offices: Headquartered in Oslo, Norway, with additional offices in Europe and North America
8) Silver Lake
Overview: Silver Lake is a private equity and venture debt firm. It specializes in private later-stage, pre-IPO companies through both public and private debt instruments. Its private equity investments include recapitalizations, leveraged buyouts, take-private transactions, growth capital, targeting middle market and large-cap companies.
Geographic Focus: Invests globally, focusing on Europe, North America, Asia, China, Brazil, India, and Israel.
Investment Criteria:
- Equity Ticket: $25 million to $1 billion
- Enterprise Value: $50 million to $500 million or more
- Stake: Acquires both majority and minority stakes
Sector Focus:
Primarily invests in technology and technology-enabled industries, including IT infrastructure, financial technology, mobile communications, e-commerce, cybersecurity, energy, healthcare, and clean technology.
Key Offices: Headquartered in Menlo Park, California, with additional offices in Central, Hong Kong; London, Greater London; New York, New York; and Singapore.
9) Hellman & Friedman
Overview: Hellman & Friedman is a private equity firm specializing in leveraged recapitalizations, acquisitions, buy-and-build strategies, traditional buyouts, financial restructurings, growth investments, and minority investments. It invests in both public and private companies.
Geographic Focus: Invests primarily in North America, Europe (with a focus on Western Europe), and Australia.
Investment Criteria:
- Equity Ticket: $50 million to $1.2 billion
- Stake: Can take majority or minority stakes, often as a controlling shareholder or influential minority investor
- Approach: Prefers to invest alongside management in companies undergoing transitions, such as going public, de-mutualizing, or executing public-to-private transactions
Sector Focus: Focuses on financial services (including asset management, insurance, and financial technology), retail, consumer, energy, industrials, healthcare, vertical software, business and information services (including marketing, data, and professional services), Internet, and digital media. The firm typically avoids energy and industrial businesses with significant macroeconomic or commodity exposure.
Key Offices: Headquartered in San Francisco, California, with additional offices in New York, New York, and London, United Kingdom.
10) Vista Equity Partners
Overview: Vista Equity Partners is a private equity specializing in lower middle-market, upper middle-market, and large market investments. Its main strategies include management and leveraged buyouts, growth and acquisition financings, recapitalizations, and going private transactions.
Geographic Focus: Vista invests primarily in North America and Europe.
Investment Criteria:
- Equity Ticket: $5 million to $1 billion
- Sales Value: $10 million to $1.5 billion
- Enterprise Value: $25 million to $10 billion
- Stake: Typically acquires a majority stake
Sector focus: Invests in technology-enabled businesses and mature companies where technology can create value. Key sectors include agriculture, automotive, collaboration, data & analytics, education, energy, enterprise software, financial services, government, healthcare, HR & recruiting, IT operations, legal, media, real estate, retail, security, telecommunications, and transportation.
Key Offices: Headquartered in Austin, Texas, with additional offices in Oakland, California, North America, and Asia.
Source: Company websites; Mergermarket; S&P Capital IQ
Have you received an offer for your business from a private equity firm?
Have you received an offer for your business from a private equity firm?
Congratulations! Receiving an offer is a testament to your hard work and dedication. Enjoy the moment, but don’t rush into a decision—remember, the first offer is rarely the best one.
Having a software M&A advisor by your side can help streamline the transaction process and help you achieve your needs. M&A advisors bring expertise, strategic guidance, and extensive networks to ensure you get the best deal. Accepting an offer without professional support can leave you at a disadvantage, as having only one bidder limits your negotiating power and the ability to compare offers. Software M&A advisors also help identify potential pitfalls and navigate the complexities of due diligence and negotiations with sophisticated buyers, protecting your interests. Advisors ensure your sale aligns with your long-term goals, considering management transitions, your employees, and ownership structures. By partnering with a software M&A advisor, you can stay focused on running your business with peace of mind, knowing you have an expert in your corner to bounce ideas off of and strategize with. M&A advisors are often incentivized through a success fee structure, so they only win when you win.
About Aventis Advisors
Aventis Advisors is an M&A advisor for software companies. We believe the world would be better off with fewer (but better quality) M&A deals done at the right moment for the company and its owners. Our goal is to provide honest, insight-driven advice, clearly laying out all the options for our clients – including the one to keep the status quo.
Get in touch with us to discuss how much your business could be worth and how to maximize the valuation.
