Last updated: August 7, 2026, 12:06 AM ET
Mega-Deals and Take-Privates
Apollo secured a recommended cash offer for easy Jet, valuing the FTSE 100 airline at approximately £5.7bn and ending a fast-moving four-week bidding contest. KKR agreed to acquire Integer Holdings in an all-cash transaction valuing the NYSE-listed medical device company at approximately $5.7bn. KKR also agreed to acquire Medicover India, the Indian hospital operations of Nasdaq Stockholm-listed Medicover AB, adding a scaled multi-specialty network to its healthcare portfolio.
Bodycote plc confirmed receipt of two competing conditional cash offers from CVC and Veritas Capital Fund IX in a Rule 2.4 statement issued to the London Stock Exchange. The heat treatment and metallurgical services provider is the subject of competing £1.56bn proposals from the two buyout firms. Nordic Capital struck a deal to acquire BWX Technologies' medical business in a transaction valued at up to $800m.
Sunoco agreed to acquire Court Square-backed Offen Petroleum for $600m, with the target operating a fuel distribution network delivering approximately 2.5 billion gallons annually to about 7,000 customers. Bending Spoons struck a $2.25bn Airtable deal in its first acquisition since its IPO. PE-backed Context Logic agreed to acquire chemicals manufacturer gChem from Eagle Tree for $850m, which will become its second operating business following the early 2026 acquisition of US Salt.
Clearlake co-founder Jose Feliciano is nearing a record $3.9bn MLB deal for the San Diego Padres, which would mark the most expensive franchise sale in Major League Baseball history. KKR is also set to take Integer Holdings private in a $5.7bn medical device carve-out, while Sheridan Capital Partners acquires Carolina Components Group, a provider of custom-engineered bioprocessing assemblies.
Fundraising
G Squared secured $2.3bn for its seventh flagship fund in record time, with the vehicle about twice the size of its previous fund and taking half as long to raise. Adams Street doubled its fund size with a $2.7bn secondary raise for Fund, part of a $5bn secondaries programme seeking a 50/50 split between LP-led and GP-led deployment. Apollo is roughly halfway to its target for Fund XI, which has a target of $22bn-$25bn, having begun raising in February.
Nextalia held a first close of more than €1.1bn on its second flagship fund in just five months, pulling in commitments from over 200 investors and pushing the Italian platform past €3.4bn. TPG has nabbed the lion's share of a $17bn target for TPG X and its third healthcare fund, launched in mid-2025 as part of the firm's $94bn Capital platform. Met Life Investment Management closed a $1.2bn managed secondary transaction with Lexington Partners as lead investor, the insurer's third such fund.
The EQT-managed Scaleup Europe Fund made its first investment, co-leading a €450m round into Finnish satellite imaging company ICEYE at a €10bn valuation. The EU's €5bn tech superfund is now officially open for investment, providing a major new source of scale-up capital for European technology companies.
Secondaries
Pantheon is backing a BlackRock BDC credit continuation vehicle that will house over $500m of debt positions held by TCPC, with pricing at 95% of gross fair value as of 31 December 2025. Singapore's GIC is preparing to offload around $1bn worth of private equity fund stakes on the secondary market, according to sources cited by Bloomberg. Carlyle increasingly views Alp Invest as more of a corporate finance business than a standalone secondaries unit, chief executive Harvey Schwartz said on the firm's Q2 2026 earnings call.
Cyclical tailwinds buoying secondaries will persist for the next several years, Schwartz added, as the firm's US buyout strategy distributed capital at more than double the industry rate. LGT Capital Partners launched a debut credit secondaries strategy that will seek to invest in LP-led, GP-led and opportunistic deals with an emphasis on senior lending. VC investor Ryan Moore closed on $78.5m for Revenant Ventures' debut fund, a regulatory filing shows.
Market volatility only tells part of the story of the GP-led market's domination in H1, with fundraising and expansion into new asset classes also driving growth. Assessing a quick-flip continuation vehicle on the asset's hold period alone is an imperfect metric, according to PE International analysis. Met Life closed a $1.2bn managed fund deal with Lexington, having shopped a portfolio of funds and co-investments with a net asset value of $1.8bn.
Energy and Infrastructure
LS Power agreed to acquire the Brazos Valley gas-fired power plant from Constellation, satisfying a regulatory divestiture commitment tied to Constellation's 2025 acquisition of Calpine. Partners Group agreed to acquire a majority stake in AVK Power, which has delivered more than 20,000 projects and installed approximately 3.5GW of power for data centers across Europe's FLAP-D markets. Veritas agreed to acquire Greenbelt-backed Saber Power Services, a vertically integrated power infrastructure services platform.
Apollo agreed to acquire Maverick Water Group from Crosstimbers Capital Group, backing Texas water infrastructure through the Houston-based operator of alternative non-potable water systems. The Danish retirement scheme Industriens Pension is mulling adding more infra secondaries exposure, favouring indirect over direct investment and having made commitments to all five infra secondaries vehicles managed by Pantheon. The US Navy budget is over $300bn, a figure larger than the GDP of over 75% of the world's countries, driving five reasons private equity is betting big on US Naval investments.
Healthcare
Ares Management is leading a $2.2bn private credit package to finance Med Impact Holdings' planned acquisition of Puerto Rico-based Medical Card System, according to Bloomberg. Sheridan Capital Partners acquired Carolina Components Group, a provider of custom-engineered bioprocessing assemblies, with the firm anticipating strong interest when it eventually sells. Nordic Capital's up to $800m radiopharma bet on BWX Technologies' medical isotopes business highlights growing PE interest in specialised healthcare assets. Tortuga Growth Partners invested in Advanced eClinical Training out of its Fund I, adding clinical training capabilities to its portfolio.
Consumer and Retail
Bain Capital agreed to acquire Gong cha from TA Associates, adding the tea beverage chain serving milk tea, fruit tea and other cold drinks to its consumer portfolio. TSG Consumer took a majority stake in Saltair, valuing the body care brand at the top of its category after three years of rapid growth. Axum Capital agreed to acquire beverage brand Barcode, a Los Angeles-based plant-based and hydration drink company.
Partners Group is in talks to buy beauty business Aroma-Zone from Eurazeo, while CVC and Veritas Capital vie for Bodycote. MPK Equity-backed Gorgeous Collective acquired Clean Your Dirty Face, its first acquisition since the platform's launch earlier in 2026.
Technology and Software
Nexa Equity-backed Facility Grid acquired autonomous commissioning company PingCx, introducing a new product strategy centered on three integrated offerings — FG Construct, Validate, and Sustain. Thoma Bravo agreed to sell Command Alkon to Francisco Partners, a software and platform technology provider for the heavy building materials industry. A16z backed HappyRobot at a $1.2bn valuation, adding to its AI portfolio.
Ash Grove backed 10x Banking, which provides cloud-native core banking technology enabling financial institutions to modernize legacy infrastructure. Legaltech Wordsmith raised a $14m Series B extension from Index and FT Ventures. Moove raised $250M to become the backbone of the robotaxi industry, scaling up autonomous vehicle fleet management and planning to someday own Waymo robotaxis.
Verdane made a majority investment in Factbird, a Danish IoT and recurring software company providing manufacturing intelligence services. Copley Equity-backed FMG Leading snapped up Broadbranch Advisors in a deal that closed at the end of July. EIP and Ocean Sound-backed Convey acquired government and utility software Selectron, bringing together two companies providing omnichannel communications and engagement operating systems.
LP Activity and Investor Intentions
Italian pension fund ENPAV released an RFP for private equity co-investment opportunities. MMAA looks to commit 300bn Korean won to domestic blind pool PE/VC funds for 2026. Korea Post Insurance seeks to commit 60bn Korean won to domestic blind-pool VC funds for 2026.
Boston Retirement Systems issued an RFP for up to an $85m private equity mandate. New Jersey's Division of Investment sees opportunity in the slow exit market, with CIO Shoaib Khan saying re-ups and new opportunities are being looked at on equal footing. Some investors have been "housing capital" in evergreens before redeeming to fund a Hamilton Lane SMA, co-chief Erik Hirsch said on a Tuesday earnings call, calling evergreen hesitancy "only temporary."
LPs are seeking to enshrine better GP reporting standards, while impact is being unfairly tarred with the ESG brush, according to PE International's Side Letter. Apollo, a year after acquiring a GP, downplays manager consolidation while backing a novel first-time fund, and CalSTRS is tackling the climate question, per another Side Letter edition. PEI Group's Data Dive analyses the Global Investor 150 ranking to ascertain the investment strategies of the world's largest PE investors.
Other Notable Deals
KKR-backed FGS scooped up government affairs firm Rich Feuer Anderson, marking its second acquisition of a bipartisan government affairs firm following the September 2025 acquisition of Tarplin, Downs & Young. Red Bird's Affinia added Wilson Partners in a UK accounting tie-up, with the firm advising SMEs, private individuals and PE investors across the UK. Wind Point Partners took ECI off H.I.G. Capital's hands in a financial services MSP handover for the New York-headquartered managed services provider.
Arlington-backed TRP Infrastructure closed five add-on deals to form a new highway plastics division called Gulf Highway Materials. Mutares completed its largest-ever deal with the $450m acquisition of Sabic's engineering thermoplastics business, rebranded Nex Point Materials, employing about 2,800 people and generating roughly $2.5bn in annual revenue. Advent and Harbour Vest agreed to acquire FNZ Bank in Germany, an independent wealth management banking and infrastructure provider connecting more than 50,000 financial advisers.
Waterland took a majority stake in Danish industrial services firm Norisol, which posted an operating margin of over 13% in 2025 and expects revenue to exceed DKr1bn in 2026. Veritas agreed to acquire environmental consultant Trinity Consultants from Oak Hill, which acquired the firm in 2021 from LLCP. Ridgemont acquired remediation services firm Entact from JFLCO, a national provider of environmental remediation and geotechnical construction services.
Wynnchurch-backed Trimlite bought doormaker Barnett Millworks, expanding its geographic footprint into the Southeast market. BV Investments backed workforce compliance service provider Thomas & Company, partnering with CEO Nate Kenney to support the company's next phase of growth. GSAM is lining up data center contractor Divcon for sale, sources say, with the firm providing building management and electrical power monitoring systems to data centers and other mission-critical facilities.
Venture and Startup News
Global venture funding showed no signs of slowing in July, with startup capital totaling $65 billion, up 100% year over year, as the month notched the highest-ever number of billion-dollar venture rounds. European robotics startups raised more in six months than the past two years combined, according to Sifted data. Fintech startup Moss was crowned Europe's newest unicorn with a €30m Series C.
Oxylabs hit a $3.6bn valuation after a decade of turning down VCs, with founders citing "right timing, right partner." Zurich-based Exclaim Robotics came out of stealth with $4.95m for data center robots. Plural backed a $43m round for battery startup Ore Energy for iron-air battery technology.
Wind Borne Systems raised a $37 million Series B to scale its weather balloons and AI forecasts. Yann LeCun joined a new VC firm with 244 LPs, according to Sifted. Nscale will provide compute to Oxford, UCL and Imperial AI researchers as part of a new initiative.
Robinhood launched a fund that lets any retail investor back Y Combinator startups. Y Combinator's growing class of repeat founders shows second-timers are returning in greater numbers, with a dataset of 454 repeat founders analyzed by Crunchbase News. The UK expanded its talent visa to more than 100 companies, broadening access for startups and scale-ups.
AI and Data Trends
The rise of AI content could lead to a "rights-clean" data re-rating, said Graphite's Mike Tilbury, who argued the market still values many of these businesses as ordinary information or subscription companies. AI has enormous potential to improve administration, metadata management, royalty processing and licensing efficiency in music, said Reed Smith's Josh Love, who noted "we're seeing some of the biggest deals the music industry has ever seen." Njord Partners' Arvid Trolle says AI is now a natural part of how the firm operates, and a key part of operational improvements for the special situations investor.
Music is an "exceptionally active" market with PE firms like Blackstone, TPG and EQT also active in partnering with AI businesses, per PE Hub's analysis. While integrating AI into a startup's product strategy is often viewed as a way to enhance valuation, it can inadvertently reduce exit value, argues tech strategic adviser Itay Sagie. The market still values many of these businesses as ordinary information or subscription companies, when what they own is a critical and defensible input into everyone else's AI, Tilbury added.
Trends and Analysis
Mega-firms are largely defying fundraising and exit headwinds, according to PE International's earnings analysis, with OMERS plotting a fivefold increase of its PE portfolio. Over 127,000 workers at US-based tech companies were laid off in mass job cuts in 2025, per a Crunchbase News tally, with layoffs continuing into 2026. Europe's 50 most active equity investors in H1 2026 have been ranked by Sifted, with 144 new funds launched this year revealing Europe's investment market pulse.
Nik Storonsky faces a lawsuit over a €350m superyacht commission, according to Sifted. Broad Sky grew Smith + Howard 4x before exiting to TPG, with CEO Tyler Zachem noting "the business is durable; tax and audit advisory are needed in good and bad times." Lightspeed partners Josh Machiz and Claire Zau discussed strategies behind their growing social media presence and their podcast, Lightwork, including how they found their newest hire via Instagram DM.