How PE Firms Win with Relationship Intelligence

The Challenge

Summit Capital had built strong relationships over 20 years, but those relationships lived in partners' heads and scattered CRM notes. When evaluating a new target, the team spent hours asking around and searching LinkedIn to find warm paths—often missing connections that existed within their own network.

The Solution

Verata mapped Summit's entire relationship network across partners, principals, operating advisors, and portfolio company executives. Within the first week, the team discovered they had warm paths to 60% of their active target list through connections they didn't know existed.

The Results

• Proprietary deal flow increased from 23% to 47% of total pipeline
• Average time from target identification to first meeting dropped by 40%
• Closed three deals in Year 1 that originated from Verata-discovered paths
• Deal team saves 15+ hours per week previously spent on manual relationship mapping

The Challenge

Blue Harbor was spending $200K+ per executive search with external recruiters, with mixed results. Placements took 6-9 months, and 30% of executives placed didn't make it past year two. The team knew they had better industry knowledge than generalist recruiters but lacked the data infrastructure to act on it.

The Solution

Verata's executive intelligence gave Blue Harbor's talent team comprehensive profiles on every healthcare executive in their target universe—complete with career trajectories, deal involvement, and most importantly, relationship paths through their existing network.

The Results

• Reduced reliance on external search firms by 60%
• Average time-to-placement dropped from 7 months to 2.5 months
• Placement success rate (2+ year tenure) improved to 92%
• Built a proprietary database of 500+ pre-vetted healthcare executives

The Challenge

As a growth equity firm focused on vertical software, Meridian needed comprehensive sector coverage. But manual market mapping was taking analysts weeks per sub-sector, and the maps were outdated by the time they were finished. Worse, there was no systematic way to identify relationship paths to the companies they found.

The Solution

Verata enabled Meridian to instantly map any vertical software sub-sector, seeing every company that matched their criteria along with revenue estimates, growth signals, and relationship paths. Sector coverage became a repeatable weekly process rather than a quarterly project.

The Results

• Sector mapping time reduced from 3 weeks to 1 day
• Increased coverage from 400 to 2,000+ companies per sector
• Booked 180 first meetings in Year 1 through Verata-identified paths
• Built proprietary sector intelligence that compounds over time

The Challenge

Atlantic Partners was stuck in a reactive sourcing model—waiting for bankers to bring deals meant competing in every process and paying full multiples. The partners knew their network was their competitive advantage but had no way to systematically leverage it.

The Solution

Verata became the foundation of Atlantic's new 'network-first' sourcing model. Before any cold outreach or banker relationship, the team checks Verata for warm paths. The result is that most first conversations happen through trusted introductions rather than cold calls.

The Results

• 65% of deals now sourced through proprietary channels vs. 28% before
• Reduced banker-originated deals from 72% to 35% of pipeline
• Average entry multiple dropped by 0.8x on proprietary deals
• One proprietary deal delivered 25x return on annual Verata investment