Top PE Firms 2025 (HEC Rankings)
Top 20 out of 632 large-cap firms
1. Blue Owl Capital (GP stakes)
2. Francisco Partners
3. TA Associates
4. TJC
5. Hg
6. Welsh, Carson, Anderson & Stowe
7. Thoma Bravo
8. Waterland Private Equity
9. Veritas Capital
10. Genstar Capital
11. GTCR LLC
12. New Mountain Capital
13. K1 Investment Management
14. Audax Private Equity
15. Great Hill Partners
16. Providence Equity Partners
17. Triton Partners
18. CLAYTON, DUBILIER & RICE LIMITED
19. Stone Point Capital
20. TowerBrook
Usual UMM suspects like FP, TA, Hg, GTCR, Genstar, Veritas, many of which of have made lots of money from SaaS. Not sure if it would continue moving forward
Surprised to see Providence and TowerBrook. Other threads have categorized those as dying funds. Are they making a comeback from their lows a few years ago? Or is there a flaw in methodology? Wonder if this would change their fundraising trajectory (Providence halved fund size in 2023 and TowerBrook struggling to raise)
Wonder what the IRR threshold is to make this list? Are all those top quartile overall? Seems like it's just the best performance for funds raised from 2010 - 2020.
Considering TA's current marks, this list is entirely out of touch
What’s happening to their marks right now?
You can look at various pension docs, but long story short they aren’t good and that is without the SaaSpocalypse markdown (latest docs are Q3 2025)
Lists like these are lagging indicators. Fundraising performance and recent fund performance are better indicators of LP perception and ultimately what matters. You want to go to a growing platform because the idea is that as the firm expands there is naturally a need for more mid-levels, which is an appealing spot to be in as an associate trying to make senior associate or senior associate trying to make VP.
But fundraising is also a lagging indicator. If a fund didnt raise well in 2024, it more so reflects performance prior to 2022. This list shows the performance of past vintages in 2025 which gives a more accurate picture of DPI from exits and MOIC of those investments
For what it’s worth, I’ve heard both Thoma and Hg are 2x funds
depending on the vintage, that could be top quartile
Many large cap PE firms underwrite to 18% or 20% IRR these days. Most LPs are happy with these returns given the large amount of $s they can put in at once (as long as they are actually getting their money back of course).
Its lower than that in reality for the UMMs that aren’t institutions yet and need to keep
money moving for their compensation schemes. Big UMM buyouts being underwritten to probably low teens net returns if not lower.
this just goes to show the HEC ranking is meaningless and you can cut the data in a million different ways
You know these rankings mean nothing if Providence is on the list their given it's pretty abudnantly clear LP's have no trust in them given their recent fundraising track record (last fund closed at a little over half of the target despite a very long fundraise). Yes fundraising is hard, but there is still firms raising oversubscribed funds. I do think this provides an initial list of firms to researchl, but about where the value ends.
Look at Blue Owls stock price and decide whether it should be at the top of this list
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