Investors in private equity are looking beyond their home markets in search of returns that outperform fixed income investments and the public markets. Foreign investing makes the due diligence process even more critical to success. Tasks like sourcing and screening deals, valuation, finding local partners and advisers, negotiating and contracting become more challenging and complex. One of the ways to address these challenges is to use online tools and services, either accessing them individually, or through highly integrated and global platforms like DealMarket. By using online platforms users can save money and increase productivity in the pre-investment and post-investment processing steps, lowering the barriers to success.
During the last two years, deal activity regained momentum, with 10'941 private equity transactions and a disclosed deal volume of USD 243bn in 2011. Furthermore, the considerable amount of dry powder built up during the global crisis promises solid ongoing deal flow. However, valuation multiples are expected to heat up as relatively large quantities of capital compete for a relatively small number of deals.