MarTech / Tech-enabled Services
One cold email, one call, then a portfolio-wide tech reckoning
It started with one email, one call, and one deal — a MarTech business whose platform could not scale without hiring 300 admin heads. The diligence found a multi-million pound replatform, and the market opportunity was strong enough to make it worth funding. It ended with a review of the whole portfolio.
- Client
- Investor in tech-enabled services (portfolio-wide engagement)
- Service
- Tech Due Diligence + Portfolio Review + Value Creation
- Stage
- Pre-deal, post-deal and exit readiness
01
The challenge
- —The investor had acquired several tech-enabled services businesses without formal Tech DD
- —MarTech target running on workarounds; the growth plan implied roughly 300 additional admin heads
- —A multi-million pound replatform sitting outside the plan, found before close rather than after
- —Across the portfolio: cyber gaps, development practice issues and people problems, none of them surfaced
- —Exit windows approaching with no view of whether the technology would stand up to a buyer's diligence
02
Our approach
01
Start with the deal in front of them
Tech DD on the MarTech business established that in-house process and software could not absorb the growth trajectory. The honest answer was a replatform, priced and staged rather than presented as a red flag.
02
Build the investment case with management, not for them
We worked with the CEO and CTO to develop the business case, the roadmap and the investment case — then coached them on how to present it to their investors. They owned the ask in the room.
03
Oversee the delivery
We stayed with the portco for a couple of years until the programme was finished, rather than handing over a document and leaving.
04
Then look across the whole portfolio
A DD-style assessment of every other portco, weighted towards current technology spend, whether that spend was sensible, and what exit readiness looked like in the next few years.
05
Make the hard calls, sensitively
In one portco we found cultural issues and an overloaded roadmap, and reduced two technology products to one. The CTO did not like it. It aligned the technology function with the business need: fast growth on the services side.
03
Outcomes
- ✓MarTech replatform scoped, priced and funded as a deliberate investment, with the deal still worth doing
- ✓300 admin hires avoided by fixing the platform rather than staffing around it
- ✓Management team able to present their own technology investment case to investors
- ✓Whole portfolio assessed for spend sensibility and exit readiness
- ✓Cyber, development and people issues surfaced and dealt with across the portcos
Takeaway
"A multi-million pound replatform is not a reason to walk. Found before close and priced properly, it becomes part of the investment case. Investors get burnt by the portco nobody diligenced, not by the number they went in with their eyes open on."
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