Find the right company.
Know the owner. Know why now.
Company data, ownership history, credit signals, and your firm’s relationships,
brought into one evidence-backed view of the opportunities worth pursuing.
Not the document.
Answers for the person
who makes the call.
Most AI for private markets automates what analysts produce. Top Bucket AI is built around what a managing director needs to decide: which companies, which owners, why now, who should call, and what happens next.
Which companies fit the thesis
A saved mandate — geography, sector, EBITDA, control requirements, ownership duration — becomes a maintained universe of qualified companies with the evidence attached.
Who controls each one, and for how long
A dated ownership timeline: acquisition, owning fund, recapitalizations, continuation transfers, exits. The original sponsor and the current vehicle are recorded separately.
What changed that makes it timely
Fund age, debt maturities, lender marks, leadership changes, and sale-process evidence, each labeled corroborated or inferred. A long hold is a fact, not a signal.
Who should call, and what happens next
The firm’s permitted relationship history surfaces the strongest path to the decision-maker, and every opportunity carries an owner and a next action.
For the managing director.
Not the analyst.
The value of a sourcing effort is decided long before anyone formats a deck: when a senior professional chooses which company to pursue, which owner to call, and when. Top Bucket AI is built around that decision. Analysts still validate evidence and resolve gaps in the same system, but the default experience centers on commercial judgment, not document production.
A short list.
With the reasons attached.
The primary screen is an opportunity briefing, not a document queue. Each company shows why it fits, why now, and how confident the evidence is, before anyone opens a file.
| Company | Sponsor / fund | Held | EBITDA | Why now | Evidence |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Northgate Facility ServicesOhio, U.S. | Halberd Partners · Fund IV | 6.8 yrsAcquired Nov 2019 | US$24mFY25 · reported | Fund IV past its investment period; term loan matures 2027 | Corroborated |
| Cedar Ridge LogisticsOntario, Canada | Marlowe Capital · Fund III | 7.1 yrsAcquired Aug 2019 | C$41m → US$30mFY24 · lender estimate | Continuation fund declined in 2025; CEO transition announced | Partial |
| Lakeshore Compliance GroupIllinois, U.S. | Tamarack Equity · Fund II | 6.2 yrsAcquired Jun 2020 | US$14mFY25 · reported | New lender at 2026 repricing; add-on program paused | Corroborated |
| Meridian Field TestingTexas, U.S. | Halberd Partners · Fund IV | 6.1 yrsAcquired Jul 2020 | UnknownAcquisition year only | Sponsor exited two comparable holdings in 2026 | Gap |
| Brightwater Route ServicesAlberta, Canada | Ashford Growth · Fund V | 8.0 yrsAcquired Sep 2018 | US$42mFY25 · reported | Sale announced; moved to the exited view | Exited |
Cedar Ridge Logistics
Marlowe Capital · Fund III (2018 vintage) · held 7.1 years
Why this fits
Contract logistics for industrial customers, control-owned by Marlowe since 2019, inside the mandate on scale and geography. Original sponsor and current owning vehicle are the same.
Why now
Fund III is beyond its investment period. A 2025 continuation transfer was explored and did not proceed. A new CEO started in Q2 2026. Sale intent is not established.
Who to call
The relationship owner met Marlowe’s deal team on a 2024 process. Suggested route: partner-to-partner conversation before any intermediary contact.
Sources
Acquisition release (Aug 2019) · Marlowe portfolio page (Sep 2026) · BDC 10-Q schedule (Jun 2026) · Firm CRM note (Nov 2024).
Next action
Resolve the entity match and confirm a dated EBITDA before the first conversation. Owner: the relationship partner.
MD decision requiredFit, timing, path in, sources, next action. Every time.
See the full workspaceThe aging portfolio
is the
origination map.
Our first sourcing strategy targets U.S. and Canadian operating companies with US$10–50 million of EBITDA, under controlling PE ownership for six to seven years or longer. Two universes are built and combined: current sponsor portfolios, and the borrowers in business development company investment schedules.
Find U.S. and Canadian business-services companies with US$10–50 million EBITDA, controlled by PE sponsors for at least six years. Explain the reason to approach each owner and identify what still needs verification.A mandate, as an MD would write it
Bain’s 2026 outlook estimates roughly 32,000 unsold PE portfolio companies worldwide, with holding periods at exit averaging about seven years. That is the global backdrop, not a list of sellers: an aging investment is a reason to look, never proof of intent or of a discount. Source: Bain, Global Private Equity Report 2026
Read the sourcing thesisper company
A mandate goes in.
Sourced findings come out.
Specialist research agents collect disclosures, match entities, verify control, qualify financials, and prepare briefs. Every completed step improves the company record, and every gap stays visible.
Find U.S. and Canadian business-services companies with US$10–50m EBITDA, held by a PE sponsor for six years or more, and explain the reason to approach each owner.
Discovery
Collect licensed records and BDC schedules
Ownership check
Verify control, closing dates, and owning fund
Financial fit
Reconcile dated EBITDA, currency, and definitions
Opportunity brief
Rank fit, timing, and evidence separately
Business services mandate · Opportunity briefing
Twelve companies qualified from 140 candidates. Four carry a corroborated reason to engage now. Three need a dated EBITDA figure confirmed before a call. Two companies moved to the exited view after announced sales.
From a written mandate to a decision the MD can defend.
Meet the research agentsThe leading sources.
One consistent view.
Each decision draws on a different layer of evidence. Providers are selected on verified coverage of your targets, freshness, provenance, and usable integration rights. Connection states are shown honestly; no vendor connection is represented as live on this website.
Company and transaction backbone
PitchBook or S&P Capital IQ Pro for sponsor relationships, acquisition and exit history, sector, geography, and financials where available.
Evaluating on a 100-company sampleBDC holdings and credit history
SEC EDGAR filings and specialist BDC data for borrower identity, instruments, maturities, interest terms, valuation history, and disclosed credit flags.
Public source · vendor under evaluationInstitutional and supplemental intelligence
FactSet for PE and VC relationships and corporate entities, Crunchbase for discovery, and CVCA research for Canadian market context.
Evaluating incremental coveragePrimary ownership evidence
Sponsor websites, company announcements, and transaction releases for control acquisitions, current portfolio status, sales, and rebrands, each stored with its publication date.
Collected with dates and snapshotsFirm relationship intelligence
Your CRM and authorized correspondence and meeting records: prior conversations, relationship owners, introductions, passed deals, and next actions.
Your license · your permissionsPrivate financial evidence
Authorized CIMs, financial statements, lender materials, and data rooms for dated EBITDA, performance, capital structure, and diligence gaps.
Authorized upload onlyStart with one company backbone and one BDC collection path. Add a provider only when a sample proves incremental coverage.
How the data comes together
From thesis
to first conversation.
Thesis-driven sourcing, sponsor coverage, company briefs, buyer identification for sell-side mandates, refinancing origination, and the monitoring of companies the firm previously passed on.
Thesis-driven deal sourcing
From a mandate to a short list of owners worth calling.
Explore workflow 02Deal sourcingSponsor & ownership intelligence
Every sponsor’s portfolio, fund age, and exit pattern in one map.
Explore workflow 03Deal sourcingCompany brief & why-now
One page a managing director can act on: fit, timing, path in, gaps.
Explore workflow 04Sell-side advisoryBuyer identification for sell-side mandates
The strategic and sponsor buyers with a real reason to act.
Explore workflow 05Credit originationRefinancing & maturity origination
Find the borrowers whose capital structure is about to change.
Explore workflow 06Deal sourcingWatchlist & passed-deal monitoring
The companies you passed on, watched until the timing changes.
Explore workflowUnderwriting, monitoring, and reporting workflows follow the decision.
Explore all workflowsOrigination
for every kind of firm.
How a PE managing director, a search fund principal, a private credit originator, and a sell-side banker each turn a mandate into better-qualified conversations.
An origination desk for aging sponsor-held companies.
How a managing director at a middle-market buyout firm could turn a thesis into a maintained universe of long-held, PE-controlled companies, each with the reason to call attached.
Illustrative case study
A lean search. An institutional-grade sourcing engine.
How a searcher could run proprietary outreach and intermediated deal flow from one maintained universe of owner-operated and sponsor-held companies, with the reason to call attached to each.
Illustrative case study
Refinancing origination and surveillance, sized for a lean team.
An architecture for an emerging direct-lending manager that finds sponsor-backed borrowers approaching a maturity or lender transition, and keeps the existing portfolio under watch with the same team.
Illustrative case study
The buyers with a real reason to act, on every mandate.
A multi-agent architecture for a sell-side practice that builds evidence-backed buyer universes, tracks sponsor coverage, and keeps one governed fact base across the process.
Illustrative case studyIllustrative engagement blueprints, not measured client results.
View the case studiesThe last step.
Not the product.
Once an opportunity is worth advancing, the record already holds the evidence. Briefs, models, and slides are generated from it on request, in your firm’s templates, with the sources carried through.
See the platformCompany brief and IC memo
The five-section brief, expanded into a memorandum when the committee needs it, with every material fact linked to its dated source.
Excel model
Dated financials, ownership timeline, and capital structure exported into your model template. Estimated figures stay labeled as estimates.
PowerPoint
A sponsor map or opportunity summary rendered in the firm’s deck format, generated from the record rather than assembled by hand.
CRM and pipeline sync
Pipeline stages, owners, and dispositions written back to DealCloud or Salesforce only after a person approves the change.
Your relationships.
Within your boundaries.
Licensed data is used within its rights. Relationship records are visible only to the professionals entitled to them. Single-tenant deployment, customer-managed keys, attribute-based access, and an immutable audit trail come with the platform.
Explore the security architectureGood questions.
Clear answers.
Managing directors, partners, and senior dealmakers at private equity firms, investment banks, private credit managers, family offices, and acquisition platforms, along with search fund principals and smaller investment firms. The default experience centers on commercial decisions: which company, which owner, why now, who should call. Analysts validate evidence and resolve gaps in the same system, but the product is not a document factory.
No. A database gives you profiles. Top Bucket AI gives you a maintained opportunity universe built from your own mandate, with ownership timelines, dated financials, seller signals, your firm’s relationship context, and the research gaps still open. The reason for attention is visible before anyone opens a document.
A licensed company and transaction backbone such as PitchBook or S&P Capital IQ Pro, SEC filings of business development companies and specialist BDC data, supplemental sources such as FactSet, Crunchbase, and CVCA research, primary ownership evidence from sponsor websites and announcements, and your firm’s own CRM and authorized records. Providers are chosen on verified coverage of your targets, and integration rights are confirmed before any connection is described as live.
By following explicit interpretation rules. A BDC lender is not the controlling sponsor. A loan’s first appearance is not an acquisition date, and its disappearance may be a refinancing rather than a sale. An announced exit is not a completed one. A loan markdown is not a discount to equity value. Missing EBITDA stays unknown rather than becoming an estimate that reads as a fact. Fit, seller pressure, business risk, and evidence confidence are shown separately.
They are delivery formats, not the product. Once an opportunity is worth advancing, models and slides are generated from the company record in your firm’s templates, with sources carried through. We deliberately do not lead with document automation, because the value of a sourcing effort is decided long before anyone formats a deck.
Yes. An engagement begins with a written mandate and a validation sample of around 100 companies across the U.S. and Canada, comparing data providers on the same sample and measuring current-control verification, acquisition-date accuracy, recent EBITDA coverage, entity-match accuracy, and false positives from completed exits. The interactive examples on this website use fictional companies and people.
Bring a real mandate.
Leave with a short list.
Evaluate a sourcing workflow on authorized sample data, with the evidence and the gaps in view.