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Summary
Large private equity managers continued to capture a growing share of fundraising through 2025, tightening competition and raising the bar for entry among mid-tier sponsors. At the same time, slower middle-market M&A and a muted IPO market have elongated the timeframe to exits and depressed distributions, pressuring GPs to find ways to return capital and giving reason for LPs to increase their selectivity. As 2026 gets underway, how will dealmakers lean on available financing and creative structures to keep the flywheel spinning?‑market M&A moving
Our panel discussion will cover:
- How fundraising trends are changing deal competition, speed, and certainty
- Liquidity constraints and return-of-capital pressure influencing exit paths and hold periods
- Financing conditions and their impact underwriting and valuations
- Strategies in 2026 to bridge valuation gaps and move transactions along
Moderator
S&P Global Market Intelligence
Ely Fal
Associate Director of Market Development, Data & Research Solutions
Ely Fal is a market development associate in the desktop business development team based in London where his key focus areas are corporates and professional services in Europe. Throughout his time at S&P Global, Ely has worked with emerging start-ups and mature companies in private and public markets with scopes spanning Corporate Development, M&A, Strategy, Credit Risk, ESG and Business Development.
Speakers
S&P Global Market Intelligence
Joe Mantone
Editorial Senior Lead, US Financial Institutions News
Joe Mantone is the News Desk Manager for the U.S. financial institutions group at S&P Global Market Intelligence and the author of a quarterly white paper on M&A and equity capital markets activity. He also hosts the new podcast The Pipeline: M&A and IPO Insights.
Joe joined the U.S. FIG team in 2008 and covered investment banks for more than 10 years before moving into his current role. Joe has been working as a business journalist for nearly 20 years and previously worked for The Wall Street Journal and the Crain Communications magazine, Modern Healthcare. Joe is based in New York.
He holds a master’s degree in journalism from Roosevelt University and a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Arizona State University.
S&P Global Market Intelligence
Cornelia Andersson
Head of With Intelligence
Cornelia is the Head of With Intelligence, a leading provider of data and intelligence on alternative assets and private markets and now part of S&P Global. Cornelia is an experienced business leader in data and analytics, focused on creating value from data and intelligence. Previously, Cornelia was at the London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG), where she was a member of the leadership team for the Data & Analytics division, a top 3 global market data and analytics provider. At LSEG, Cornelia led the Investment Banking/Corporate Finance and Sustainable Finance businesses, managing product portfolios including data platforms, workflow solutions, analytics and reporting solutions.
Cornelia has strong professional roots in private markets, having spent over a decade with Blackstone, the world’s largest alternative asset manager, leading the firm’s market data, research and intelligence functions. As such, Cornelia has a wealth of industry experience and first hand understanding of customer needs and workflows in private markets.
Additionally, Cornelia is a board member of the royal Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals, and Position Green, a Nordic sustainability reporting and consulting business. She holds a MBA from Imperial College, a Master’s degree from Lund University and is a chartered information professional (MCLIP) as well as financial information associate (FIA). Cornelia is a regular public speaker at industry events.
Motive Partners
Bob Brown
Founding Partner & Head of Capital Formation & Investor Relations
Bob Brown joined Motive Partners in 2019, where he is a Founding Partner and Head of Capital Formation & Investor Relations.
As a member of the Motive leadership team, he is also a member of the firm’s Growth & Buyout Investment Committee.
Bob was instrumental in the successful close of Motive Capital Fund 1 in 2019, which secured over $485 million in capital from public pension plans, sovereign wealth funds, alternative asset managers, family offices, endowments and foundations across North America, Europe, the Middle East and Australasia. Following the successful close of Motive’s first fund, Bob was again instrumental in leading the capital raise for the firm’s second fund, which closed at $2.54 billion (inclusive of co-investment), positioning Motive as one of the world’s largest investors exclusively focused on financial technology. Bob formerly held the position of Head of Investor Relations for Motive Capital Corp (NYSE: MOTV.U), the special purpose acquisition corporation sponsored by Motive’s funds.
Prior to joining Motive Partners, Bob spent 26 years in various business development, capital formation and leadership roles. Most recently, he was a Co-Head of Houlihan Lokey’s Private Funds Group, a business created from the acquisition of BearTooth Advisors, which he co-founded in 2014. Bob founded BearTooth Advisors to provide strategic advisory and placement agency services to alternative investment managers. The firm used its combination of extensive in-house and agency experience to develop customized capital raising solutions for GPs, before being acquired by Houlihan Lokey in 2018.
Prior to establishing BearTooth, Bob was a Partner, Managing Director and Global Head of Marketing and Limited Partner Services at Advent International. Before Advent, he spent almost 11 years at Carlyle, concluding his tenure as a Partner. In total, he has contributed to the formation of almost 180 private investment funds and co-investment vehicles over the course of his career.
Bob earned a B.A. from Southern Methodist University and a M.B.A. from the University of Connecticut.
Questions?
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