Last updated: September 10, 2026, 10:05 PM ET
Blackstone's Liquid Cooling Bet
Blackstone has agreed to acquire Flow Control Holdings (FCH), a US manufacturer of highly engineered components for data centre liquid cooling, from Audax Private Equity, as demand grows for liquid cooling of data centers. The deal marks one of the largest recent wagers on the infrastructure underpinning the artificial intelligence boom, with Audax set to retain a minority stake in the business. Blackstone's move was flagged alongside a separate transaction in which FFL Partners completed an investment in Waylin Partners, a provider of services focused on the office of the CFO, underscoring the firm's twin appetite for AI-adjacent industrials and business services.
Mubadala Anchors $1bn Luckin Coffee Deal
Mubadala has agreed to take a significant minority position in Luckin Coffee alongside Centurium Capital, in a transaction valued at approximately $1bn. The Abu Dhabi sovereign investor is anchoring a Centurium vehicle, giving the Chinese coffee chain a deep-pocketed Gulf backer as it continues its post-scandal rebuild. The deal represents one of the largest recent commitments by a Middle Eastern fund into a Chinese consumer asset.
Fullscript Draws L Catterton and Altas Partners
L Catterton and Altas Partners have agreed to acquire a majority stake in Fullscript, the North American whole-person care platform, from HGGC and Snapdragon Capital Partners. The Ottawa, Ontario-headquartered company serves more than 135,000 practitioners and 10 million patients annually across North America. The transaction hands the consumer-focused L Catterton and the Toronto-based Altas a scaled platform in the fast-growing supplements and wellness distribution market, with HGGC and Snapdragon exiting their positions.
Mid Ocean Offloads SI Solutions to Macquarie
Mid Ocean Partners has agreed to sell SI Solutions to a Macquarie group entity. SI Solutions, headquartered in Huntersville, North Carolina, provides structural integrity engineering, testing and software solutions to critical infrastructure owners and operators across 16 locations. The sale adds to a steady stream of mid-market industrial exits as sponsors look to return capital to LPs.
1315 Capital Carves Out Argonaut Unit
1315 Capital has acquired Argonaut's life sciences and diagnostics unit, which now operates independently as Aluris Sciences. The divested business provides contract manufacturing for life sciences, diagnostics and combination drug product customers from formulation through commercial supply. The carve-out gives 1315 a dedicated platform in an outsourcing segment benefiting from pharma R&D spend.
Kiteworks Acquires Bonfy.AI
Kiteworks, backed by Insight Partners and Sixth Street, has acquired AI security firm Bonfy.AI. The target's platform classifies and enforces policies on sensitive data in real time across email, file sharing and AI systems. The bolt-on strengthens Kiteworks' position in the data security and compliance market as enterprises grapple with generative AI governance.
Vistria Names Hawkins to Portfolio Role
The Vistria Group has appointed Jeff Hawkins as head of its portfolio resources group. The middle-market private investment firm manages $18bn in assets and focuses on essential industries including healthcare, knowledge and learning solutions, and financial services. The hire signals continued build-out of operational capabilities across the portfolio.
Blue Sage and Castle Capital Launch Waste Platform
Blue Sage and Castle Capital have launched Blue Castle Waste Solutions, established through the concurrent partnering with founder-owned waste-collection businesses serving communities across Minnesota and Iowa. The platform launch reflects continued sponsor interest in fragmented, essential-services roll-ups in the waste sector.
ARCHIMED Closes MED IV at €1.5bn Hard Cap
ARCHIMED, the healthcare-focused private equity firm, has held the final close of its fourth smallcap buyout fund, MED IV, at its €1.5bn hard cap, with the vehicle three times oversubscribed. The result stands out against a difficult European fundraising backdrop and underscores LP appetite for specialist healthcare strategies.
CEECAT Capital Raises €135m First Close
CEECAT Capital has held a €135m first close for its third fund, drawing cornerstone commitments from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the European Investment Fund. The raise provides fresh capital for the Central and Eastern European specialist as development finance institutions continue to anchor emerging-market vehicles.
ADIA Lifts Private Equity Allocation
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority has raised the share of its portfolio set aside for private equity and hedge funds. Last year marked the first time in five years that the sovereign wealth fund made no change to its private equity allocation range, making the shift notable. The move adds to a broader bullish turn among Gulf institutions toward alternative assets.
Accel-KKR Takes Eleco Private in $281m Deal
Accel-KKR has agreed a $281m deal for Eleco, a London-headquartered provider of software for the construction sector. The take-private adds another UK-listed software company to the sponsor's portfolio and extends a run of public-to-private transactions in the built-environment technology niche.
Novo Holdings Inks First China Medtech Deal
Novo Holdings, the investment arm of Denmark's Novo Nordisk Foundation, has completed its first Chinese medtech deal with For You Medical Devices, part of a broader Asia ramp-up. Regional head Amit Kakar said the firm is expanding both the size of its tickets and its team in Asia. The transaction was disclosed alongside Ambienta's fourth add-on for its No Dig Alliance platform and Accel-KKR's Eleco agreement in a busy deal roundup.
Ambienta's No Dig Alliance Buys Horisonterra
Ambienta announced that its portco No Dig Alliance has acquired Horisonterra, a Swedish specialist in trenchless underground pipe installation, marking the platform's fourth add-on since Ambienta took control. Horisonterra is based in Torsåker and uses horizontal directional drilling to serve infrastructure contractors and public authorities across Sweden.
Brenton Point Backs Lakeshore Ag
Brenton Point Capital has invested in crop nutrition firm Lakeshore Ag Distributors. Based in Allegan, Michigan, the company formulates, blends and distributes liquid fertilizer and provides customized agronomic programs to growers and agricultural dealers. The deal adds to sponsor interest in agricultural inputs and precision-nutrition services.
Relevant Solutions Acquires Conrad Kacsik
Fusion Capital-backed Relevant Solutions has acquired Conrad Kacsik Instrument Systems, headquartered in Solon, Ohio. The target provides thermal-processing control system engineering, calibration and metrology services to aerospace, automotive and medical customers. The acquisition deepens Relevant's calibration and testing capabilities in technically demanding end markets.
FFL Partners Invests in Waylin Partners
FFL Partners has invested in Waylin Partners, a Chicago-headquartered Office of the CFO advisory firm that provides forward-deployed finance engineers to private equity-backed companies. The deal reflects continued sponsor appetite for specialized consulting and finance-talent platforms serving the portfolio-company ecosystem.
Centre Partners and Altivare Acquire Expedited
Centre Partners and Altivare have acquired freight logistics provider Navajo Expedited. Headquartered in Lakeland, Florida, the company connects commercial shippers with truckload capacity through a network of more than 8,000 vetted carriers. The transaction adds to consolidation in technology-enabled freight brokerage.
Sterling-Backed OGD Completes Three Add-Ons
Sterling Group-backed OGD has completed three garage door add-on deals, acquiring Madisonville Garage Doors, Hall's Garage Doors and Compaan Garage Doors. All three are founder-owned sales, installation and service providers serving markets across the Midwest. The simultaneous acquisitions illustrate the buy-and-build playbook in fragmented home-services categories.
Vivo Capital Names Neetesh Kumar Managing Partner
Vivo Capital has tapped Neetesh Kumar as a managing partner. Kumar will co-lead the firm's buyout and private equity investment strategy with a focus on the US market and help establish Vivo's presence in New York. The appointment signals the healthcare investor's ambition to expand beyond its traditional venture and growth roots.
Zombie Funds Face 'Open Survival Ending'
Until the private equity exit environment improves, unnaturally long-life funds will continue to multiply, with the open survival ending the most likely destination for most zombie vehicles. The analysis highlights the structural challenge facing GPs unable to return capital through IPOs or trade sales.
LPs Demand Clarity on Exits and Succession
Clarity and alignment on exits, value creation and succession planning are now essential components of the fundraising formula, an LP told PEI's Commitment Issues podcast, warning that 'smoke and mirrors' will not suffice in the current environment. The comments underscore how much harder capital-raising has become for managers without a credible realization track record.
Mid-Market CEOs Raise the Bar for GPs
Capital alone is no longer the deciding factor for management teams evaluating potential GP partners, argued CEOs from Eurazeo, Astorg and Ridgepost at an industry event on Wednesday. Speaking at IPEM Global, the executives said mid-market CEOs demand more in terms of operational support, sector expertise and cultural fit before signing with a sponsor.
AI Diligence Proves Elusive for Managers
GPs including Bain and Apollo said at the UK Private Capital Summit that it is difficult to quantify claims around AI's contribution to value creation and cost reduction, leaving managers struggling with AI diligence given the pace of development. The admission points to a widening gap between AI marketing narratives and measurable portfolio impact.
Side Letter: Postcard from Paris
In the latest edition of Side Letter, dispatches from an industry event in Paris, Oregon's PE performance prompting an allocation rethink, and Archimed doubling its healthcare firepower. The Paris gathering captured a European market increasingly focused on AI, evergreen structures and the hunt for differentiated returns.
Venture Capital Moves Into Pro Sports
Collaborative Fund has bought into D.C. United and its stadium, with firm founder Craig Shapiro pitching it as a way to showcase the firm's startups. The move follows Thrive Capital leading venture investors into professional sports ownership, part of a broader trend of VC firms acquiring stakes in teams and related real estate.
Mark Wahlberg to Headline Tech Crunch Disrupt 2026
Mark Wahlberg will join Bruce K. Lee at TechCrunch Disrupt 2026 to discuss investing, entrepreneurship, healthcare, wellness and building businesses. The appearance reflects the actor-investor's expanding portfolio across consumer and health ventures.
Unicorn Board Adds 29 Companies in August
A total of 29 companies joined The Crunchbase Unicorn Board in August, adding around $63bn in value to the board, led by AI software and semiconductors. More than a third of the companies to join last month were under three years old, underscoring the accelerating pace at which AI-native startups are reaching billion-dollar valuations.
South Korea's Innovation Economy
South Korea has risen to become the world's eighth-largest national innovation ecosystem, according to guest author Alberto Onetti, chairman of Mind the Bridge. Sustained government investment and startup policy have driven the ascent, offering a template for other economies seeking to measure and build innovation capacity.
Cortea Brings AI to Auditing
Cortea is making AI trustworthy for auditors, with the company arguing that 'it's not just about automation but quality control'. The startup's pitch lands as audit firms face pressure to improve accuracy while managing costs.
The Entrepreneurial Advantage in a 100-Year Life
Longer lifespans are reshaping career structures, and the entrepreneurial advantage is becoming more pronounced as people plan for multi-decade working lives. The shift has implications for how capital and talent are deployed across successive career stages.
Geothermal Startups to Watch in 2026
Venture investors have identified 7 geothermal startups to watch in 2026, as enhanced drilling techniques and growing power demand revive interest in the sector. The list reflects rising VC conviction that geothermal can supply baseload clean energy to data centers and industrial users.
Bynario Raises €2.1m for Cybersecurity
Bynario has raised €2.1m to tackle cybersecurity's AI slop problem, targeting the noise generated by AI-driven threat detection. The seed round underscores investor appetite for tooling that helps security teams separate genuine signals from machine-generated false positives.
Samsung Backs Mistral
Samsung has backed Mistral AI in a $3bn funding round, raising the question of why the Korean electronics giant chose the French model developer. The investment deepens ties between Asian hardware manufacturers and European frontier AI labs as competition with US model developers intensifies.
Europe's Most Active Growth Equity Investors
A ranking of the most active growth equity investors in Europe shows which firms are deploying the most capital into scale-ups across the continent. The data offers a snapshot of who is winning access to Europe's fastest-growing private technology companies.