Wonder

Research Outline

Prepared for Jake H. | Delivered December 2, 2019

The Private Equity Industry

Goals

To obtain an in-depth understanding of the private equity market covering its size, amount of capital available for investment, growth rate, number of companies, players, top industries invested in, and the total amount of PE capital in the manufacturing and nutraceutical space.

Early Findings

The total number of private equity funds in the US totaled 3,951 in the second of 2019, a 72% increase from 2018.
In 2018, the total number of deals transacted in the private equity market reached an all-time high level at 5,180 deals globally. The total worth of these deals is also estimated to exceed $727 billion. As of the second quarter of 2019, 2,142 deals worth $297.1 billion had already been transacted.
As of the second quarter of 2019, IT, healthcare, and B2B as a whole represented 63% of all private equity deals in the US. Firms operating in the B2B space represents about 20% of all private equity capital. About 25% of all private equity investments were directed at the IT space, while healthcare accounts for about 18% of all capital investments. 
Globally, $2.44 trillion of private equity capital is uninvested and available for investment. Private equity firms raised a total of $714 billion from investors in 2018. In the same year, the value of private equity deals in North America reached $448 billion.
In terms of returns on invested capital, healthcare deals have returned $2.2 for every $1 of invested capital, while technology deals have returned $2.1, according to CEPRES.
On average, each private equity firm has about four (3.9) active funds in operation, and 90% of PE firms surveyed stated that they intend to maintain or increase their PE allocations.