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Private Equity & Growth Investing

Private equity and growth investing in 2026 is operating in a more functional but structurally different market: rates are off their peaks, dealmaking is recovering, but returns depend less on leverage and multiple expansion than on operational execution, AI-enabled diligence, and disciplined exits. Practitioners are also adapting to private credit’s central role, continuation vehicles and secondaries as standard liquidity tools, and regulatory/product shifts that broaden private-market access while increasing governance complexity.

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The current state

as of

Private equity and growth investing in 2026 is operating in a more functional but structurally different market: rates are off their peaks, dealmaking is recovering, but returns depend less on leverage and multiple expansion than on operational execution, AI-enabled diligence, and disciplined exits. Practitioners are also adapting to private credit’s central role, continuation vehicles and secondaries as standard liquidity tools, and regulatory/product shifts that broaden private-market access while increasing governance complexity.

What’s shaping Private Equity & Growth Investing right now

  • Operational value creation has overtaken financial engineering as the main return driver, forcing deal teams to underwrite pricing, productivity, talent, and AI levers before signing.
  • Private credit has become core deal infrastructure, changing financing workflows through bespoke unitranche, NAV loans, and lender-led structuring rather than syndicated-bank standardization.
  • DPI pressure from LPs is reshaping portfolio management, making exits, recaps, continuation vehicles, and liquidity planning central to day-to-day investment decisions.
  • Sector specialization is intensifying around AI, healthcare, energy transition, and infrastructure-like assets, because generic generalist underwriting no longer produces differentiated entry angles.
  • Retail and defined-contribution access to private markets is expanding, pushing firms toward evergreen vehicles, tighter disclosures, and operating models built for semi-liquid capital.

Skills on the rise and in decline

Rising

  • Value-creation underwriting

    It is gaining importance as ICs increasingly demand executable alpha plans that translate diligence into sequenced operating plans with KPI ownership.

  • Capital-structure engineering

    It is increasing because liquidity and financing flexibility are now key drivers of outcomes across private credit, continuation funds, and secondaries.

Declining

  • Manual LBO modeling

    Pure manual LBO modeling is losing relative importance as templated analytics and AI reduce its scarcity, shifting emphasis toward judgment about AI disruption, sector dynamics, and management quality.

This week’s brief

Continuation Vehicles Become Exit Infrastructure, AI Valuations Split by Stack Layer and Proof Point

Private equity and growth teams are being forced to operate with new exit plumbing and a more granular AI pricing playbook, changing how they source, underwrite, and defend value.

July 6, 2026

Earlier briefs

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This week’s Private Equity & Growth Investing openings

as of

Individual contributors

Deep dive

What macro trends are shaping private equity and growth investing in 2026?
In 2026, private equity and growth investing are being shaped by a more stable rate environment, which is improving deal activity and exit conditions while still requiring disciplined underwriting. Firms are shifting from financial engineering toward operational value creation, with greater emphasis on AI adoption, portfolio optimization, and stronger leadership execution. Private credit and more flexible liquidity tools are becoming more important as managers navigate longer hold periods and more complex capital structures. At the same time, regulation, democratization of private markets, and major forces like AI, decarbonization, demographics, and geopolitics are influencing where capital is deployed and how firms are organized.
What new private equity and growth investing practices are emerging in 2026?
Leading private equity and growth investors in 2026 are using more flexible capital structures, including continuation funds, evergreen vehicles, and hybrid funds, to manage longer hold periods and provide liquidity. They are also shifting from leverage-led returns toward operational value creation, with portfolio playbooks increasingly centered on pricing, procurement, talent, and AI-enabled productivity. Secondaries, co-investments, and GP-led transactions are becoming standard portfolio management tools rather than occasional exceptions. Overall, the field is moving toward more active, data-driven, and partnership-oriented investing across the full ownership cycle.
How has private equity work changed in the last six months?
Over the last six months, private equity and growth investing have become more focused on realized returns, with DPI carrying more weight in fundraising and exit planning than paper IRR. AI has moved from a theme to a practical underwriting and portfolio value-creation filter, especially in software and tech investing. Deal activity has shifted toward fewer, larger, higher-conviction transactions, which means teams spend more time on diligence, structuring, and financing certainty. With exits still constrained, continuation vehicles, secondaries, and active portfolio management have become more important parts of the workflow.
What skills matter most in private equity and growth investing in 2026?
In 2026, private equity and growth investing are placing more weight on operational value creation, AI and data fluency, and sector-specific expertise. Practitioners are expected to build concrete improvement plans for portfolio companies, analyze operational data to find growth and margin opportunities, and work effectively with digital and analytics teams. Legacy skills such as pure spreadsheet modeling, generic deal execution, and narrative-driven IRR pitching are becoming less important on their own. The strongest candidates combine investing judgment with hands-on operating insight and the ability to use technology to improve sourcing, diligence, and portfolio performance.
How is technology changing private equity and growth investing in 2026?
Private equity and growth investing teams are increasingly using AI-enabled research, market-intelligence platforms, and deal-CRM systems to speed sourcing, screening, diligence, and pipeline management. They are also adopting web data extraction and alternative-data tools to map markets more efficiently and support faster investment decisions. A growing category is portfolio value-creation software, which helps firms monitor KPIs, detect performance issues, and improve operating results across holdings. Secondaries and continuation-vehicle infrastructure are also becoming more important as firms manage liquidity and extend ownership periods.
What developments signal real change in private equity and growth investing?
Real change in private equity and growth investing is usually marked by shifts that alter capital flows, industry economics, or the business model for years, such as the migration of value from public to private markets, the rise of private credit and secondaries, and the growing role of sovereign wealth funds and retail-access vehicles. Technology shifts, especially AI, can also be structural when they change target-company quality, competitive dynamics, and how deals are sourced and diligenced. By contrast, quarterly deal volume swings, short-lived IPO window changes, and one-off regulatory headlines are usually cyclical noise. Practitioners should treat structural shifts as reasons to adjust sourcing, underwriting, and portfolio construction, not just timing.

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