The Problem We're Solving

Private markets infrastructure is fundamentally broken. While public markets have sophisticated electronic trading, data standards, and workflow automation, private markets remain stuck in a pre-digital era of manual processes, fragmented data, and relationship-dependent deal sourcing.

Institutional participants waste weeks on manual sourcing, unverified counterparties, and fragmented workflows across €300B+ in annual European deal flow. This isn't a minor inefficiency—it's a structural impediment costing the industry billions in lost productivity and missed opportunities.

"90% of inbound deal flow is complete noise. Deals that don't fit our thesis, brokers blasting hundreds of recipients, entrepreneurs with unrealistic expectations. We have three analysts spending half their time just filtering through this mess."

Market Size & Dynamics

The European private markets ecosystem represents a massive and growing opportunity:

Asset Class	EU+UK+CH AUM	Annual Transaction Volume	Secondary Volume
Private Equity	€2.6T	€180-220B	€85-95B
Real Estate	€450B	€80-100B	€15-20B
Private Credit	€400B	€60-80B	€8-12B
Infrastructure	€250B	€30-40B	€5-8B
TOTAL	€3.7T	€350-440B	€113-135B

Sources: Preqin Global Private Capital Report 2024, INREV European Real Estate Report 2024, Jefferies Secondary Market Review 2024

Why Now? Five Converging Market Drivers

1. Extended Hold Periods

Average PE fund hold period increased from 4.2 years (2015) to 6.1 years (2024), driving exponential secondary liquidity demand. This extension is caused by:

• Lack of exit opportunities: IPO markets remain challenging with only 47 European PE-backed IPOs in 2023 (down from 112 in 2021)
• Valuation expectations: GPs unwilling to sell at lower multiples despite LP pressure for distributions
• Portfolio company maturity: Companies requiring longer operational improvement timelines
• Market uncertainty: Buyers and sellers struggling to agree on valuations in volatile macro environment

This creates massive demand for secondary liquidity solutions, as LPs seek to rebalance portfolios and GPs look for continuation vehicles to extend successful investments.

2. Denominator Effect

Public market volatility has created allocation imbalances, forcing LPs to rebalance through secondaries at accelerated rates. Specifically:

• Public equity markets down 18-25% in 2022 created overallocation to private markets (which didn't mark down as quickly)
• Institutional investors with 10% target allocation to private markets suddenly found themselves at 14-16%
• Regulatory pressure (insurance companies, pension funds) to maintain allocation targets
• Result: €45-65B in secondary volume directly attributable to denominator effect rebalancing

3. Direct Secondaries Growth

GP-led secondaries grew from 38% (2020) to 61% (2024) of total secondary volume, requiring entirely new infrastructure paradigms. GP-led transactions include:

• Continuation funds: GP transfers portfolio company to new fund vehicle, offering LPs liquidity or rollover option
• Strip sales: GP sells portion of portfolio to generate liquidity while maintaining management
• Tender offers: GP facilitates partial liquidity for LPs while maintaining fund structure
• Preferred equity: GP raises structured capital against existing portfolio

These transactions require sophisticated coordination between multiple parties: existing LPs, new investors, advisors, lenders, and management teams. Traditional broker-dealer infrastructure wasn't built for this complexity.

4. Regulatory Pressure

MiFID II, AIFMD reporting requirements, and AMLD5 create demand for auditable transaction records and verified counterparty networks:

• MiFID II: Requires detailed reporting of transaction execution, best execution policies, and client communications
• AIFMD: Alternative Investment Fund Managers must report holdings, leverage, concentration, and liquidity quarterly
• AMLD5 (5th Anti-Money Laundering Directive): Mandates beneficial ownership disclosure and enhanced due diligence
• SFDR (Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation): ESG reporting requirements for financial products

Current manual processes struggle to meet these requirements. A structured platform with immutable audit trails and verified participant identities solves multiple compliance challenges simultaneously.

5. Operational Efficiency Imperative

Average time from deal identification to first meeting is 3-6 weeks across manual processes—an intolerable delay in competitive deal environments:

Activity	Time Spent	Cost (€)
Deal sourcing	15-20 hrs/week	€3,000-4,000
Counterparty verification	3-4 weeks	€5,000-10,000
NDA negotiation	1-2 weeks	€1,000-2,000
Data room setup	1-2 weeks	€2,000-3,000
Meeting coordination	Multiple days	€500-1,000
Total per deal attempt	40-80 hours	€11,500-20,000

For a mid-market PE firm executing 2-4 deals annually but evaluating 50-100 opportunities, this represents €400,000-€800,000 in annual time waste on deal coordination alone.

The Critical Gap

Despite this massive market and clear pain points, no existing platform provides a complete solution. The market is served by: