For Private Equity firms.
Technology operating partners who support PE firms across the full investment lifecycle, from DD to exit.
Supporting PE Firms Across the Full Lifecycle
Pre-Deal DD
Technology assessment designed for investment committees. Four to six weeks standard, two to three weeks for auction situations.
Hold-Period Support
Fractional CTO placement and periodic health checks that give operating partners technology visibility across the portfolio.
Exit Preparation
Pre-sale technology audit that identifies what buyers will find and addresses it before the company goes to market.
Buy-and-Build
Technology integration assessment across acquisitions — platform consolidation, team restructuring, and architecture decisions.
Technology Advisory Across the Investment Lifecycle
Most PE firms treat technology due diligence as a pre-deal exercise: a report for the data room, referenced at IC and rarely touched again. The issues identified at acquisition then compound quietly through the hold period, surfacing during exit DD as buyer leverage rather than seller opportunity. We work differently — providing technology advisory from pre-acquisition due diligence through exit, translating every finding into investment language.
Pre-Deal: Due Diligence That Informs Term Sheets
Due diligence in a private equity context should inform the investment decision, influence the price, and lay the groundwork for value creation. Our assessments are built for investment committees, not filing cabinets. We evaluate across the 5P Framework — People, Process, Product, Protection, and Platform — and translate every finding into what it costs to fix, how long it takes, and how it affects the business plan.
What We Look For
Can the technology support the growth thesis? If the business plan assumes doubling revenue in three years, can the platform handle it? In more than half our assessments, we find architecture decisions made at smaller scale that now constrain growth. Always fixable — but the remediation cost and timeline must be reflected in the deal model.
Is the team capable of executing the plan? A technology team that performed well at twenty million in revenue may lack the skills, structure, or leadership to perform at fifty million. We assess team composition, leadership quality, and key-person risk — frequently surfacing senior hires that should be factored into the value creation budget.
What has been hidden or misrepresented? CTOs, like all leaders, have incentives to present favourably. We have the operational experience to distinguish between a team that is genuinely performing and one that is "saying the right words and making big promises" while the reality tells a different story.
What are the security and compliance risks? PE-backed companies handling customer data, processing payments, or operating in regulated industries face technology risks that can become liability events. We assess whether security practices are real, not just whether the certification boxes have been ticked.
How We Deliver
Standard PE due diligence runs four to six weeks. For auction situations, we compress to two to three weeks and can deliver findings through structured verbal briefings when speed matters more than documentation. Every report includes an IC-ready executive summary, detailed assessment across all five pillars, a commercially quantified risk register, and a value creation roadmap with timeline and investment estimates.
“The platform everyone was calling 'cloud-native' was actually running on a single physical server in the CTO's garage. That finding changed the entire trajectory of the deal.”
Hold-Period: Fractional CTO Placement and Technology Oversight
The period between acquisition and exit is where technology either creates value or quietly erodes it.
Fractional CTO Placement
When a portfolio company needs technology leadership — whether the incumbent is underperforming, has left, or never existed at the required level — we place an experienced CTO from our partner bench. Our fractional CTO services page explains how this works in detail, and our PE and VC-specific fractional CTO page covers the dual reporting model that PE engagements require. They embed two to four days per week and take operational ownership of the technology function, reporting to the CEO on operations and to the operating partner on strategic progress.
The typical arc: month one, stabilise the team and assess the real state of things. Months two to three, execute the initial roadmap and address structural DD findings. Months four to six, embed sustainable processes and either transition to a permanent CTO or extend. We build capability and design ourselves out of the engagement.
Periodic Technology Health Checks
For portfolio companies that do not need ongoing CTO placement, we offer annual or semi-annual audits that track progress on DD recommendations, identify new risks, and benchmark technology maturity against the value creation plan.
Portfolio-Level Reporting
For PE firms wanting a consistent technology perspective across their portfolio, we provide regular reporting that aggregates technology risk and performance — identifying which companies are on track, which need intervention, and where risk is concentrated.
Exit Preparation: Technology That Withstands Buyer DD
We know exactly what buyers look for because we conduct buy-side DD ourselves. We assess your portfolio company the way a buyer's advisors would, identify the issues they will find, and build a remediation plan before the company goes to market. Our Rational Closedown methodology ensures a structured transition — documenting decisions, preparing handover materials, and leaving the technology organisation ready for the next phase of ownership.
Technical debt. Every company has it. Buyers distinguish between deliberate, well-understood debt and accumulated, undocumented debt. We help portfolio companies document it, quantify it, and demonstrate a credible management plan.
Key-person dependencies. If critical knowledge lives in one person's head, buyers will price it. We build the documentation, cross-training, and team structure to mitigate this before a buyer's advisor raises the flag.
Security gaps. No penetration testing, production data in dev, every developer with admin access. Common findings that give buyers leverage — and among the most straightforward to fix given lead time.
Architecture limitations. Platforms built for current scale that will not support the buyer's growth assumptions. The most expensive issue to remediate and the one that requires the most lead time. Start this conversation eighteen months before exit.
Buy-and-Build: Technology Integration Across Acquisitions
PE buy-and-build strategies create a specific technology challenge: integrating multiple platforms, teams, and architectures into a coherent whole. This is where EBITDA accretion from operational synergies either materialises or does not.
We support buy-and-build at two levels. Pre-acquisition, we assess target technology with a specific lens: platform compatibility, integration costs for the deal model, and whether the team is additive or redundant. Post-acquisition, we lead or advise on integration — platform consolidation, team restructuring, and the architectural decisions that determine whether the combined entity captures the synergies that justified the deal.
PE-Specific Services
Pre-Deal Due Diligence
Comprehensive technology assessment that informs term sheets and investment committee papers. Four to six weeks standard, two to three weeks for auction situations.
Fractional CTO Placement
Experienced CTOs embedded in portfolio companies two to four days per week, with dual reporting to CEO and operating partner.
Exit Preparation
Pre-sale technology audit that identifies what buyers will find and builds a remediation plan to protect valuation.
Buy-and-Build Support
Technology integration assessment and execution across acquisitions — platform consolidation, team restructuring, and architecture decisions.
How We Work with PE Firms
The Dual Reporting Model
For hold-period engagements, we operate with operational accountability to the portfolio company CEO and strategic reporting to the operating partner. This gives investors visibility without undermining company leadership. It works because we are genuinely independent — we do not take sides, and our only objective is improving the technology function in ways that create value for both parties.
The Relationship Model
Our most productive PE relationships are ongoing advisory arrangements. The operating partner has a technology advisor who understands the firm's portfolio, thesis, and standards. When a new deal enters the pipeline, we move fast because we already understand the context. We provide similar portfolio-level support for venture capital firms, calibrated to earlier-stage economics and expectations.
Client Testimonials
"Rational Partners has established itself as a vital technical advisor to H.I.G. European Capital Partners. Their unique blend of agility and engineering heritage sets them apart. They move beyond standard 'red flag' reporting to deliver commercially focused, actionable strategies."
"Rational Partners have been fantastic in giving us insight into the portfolio, as well as stepping in to a number of fractional roles to add a lot of value and stability."
Frequently Asked Questions
Whether you are assessing an investment opportunity, optimising portfolio technology, or preparing for exit, we are ready to help you make confident, evidence-based decisions that deliver returns.