Rivas Will

Buyer · PE

Thoma Bravo

2026-04-30

Why this buyer matters

Thoma Bravo is the world's largest software-focused private equity firm, with over $181 billion in assets under management as of 30 September 2025 (Thoma Bravo, 2025-09-12). The firm has invested in more than 535 software companies across its 40+ year history, and its current portfolio of 75+ companies generates approximately $30 billion in annual revenue and employs over 93,000 people globally (SaaStr, June 2025).

For a founder running a $2–50M ARR vertical SaaS company, Thoma Bravo is a known name — but the question is which of its three buyout platforms (if any) would actually be in the room. The answer matters because Thoma Bravo's floor on enterprise value is materially higher than Vista's Endeavor Fund floor, and below roughly $100M EV, Thoma Bravo simply does not compete at this size.

The three-fund structure

Thoma Bravo operates three buyout platforms in parallel, plus a new Europe Fund. The firm closed a record $34.4 billion fundraise across three vehicles in June 2025 (Thoma Bravo press release, 2025-06):

The Carl Press quote is the cleanest anchor: "We have three distinct buyout funds that allow us to make control investments in software up to $12 billion of enterprise value, all the way down to about $100 million of enterprise value." That $100M EV floor is the number to remember.

Worth noting: none of the other buyout funds that closed in Q1 2025 exceeded $5 billion, so the $34.4B fundraise was the single largest software-focused PE fundraise of the cycle (SaaStr, June 2025).

Relevance to the Rivas Will mandate ($2–50M ARR)

I think Thoma Bravo only enters a Rivas Will process at the very top of the band. The Explore Fund's ~$100M enterprise value floor implies, at typical 2025–2026 vertical SaaS multiples of 4–7x ARR, a minimum ARR of roughly $15–25M. Below that, a Rivas Will founder will not see Thoma Bravo in the room — they will see Vista Endeavor (targets $10–30M ARR at $30–100M purchase price), Constellation Software's six operating groups, Topicus, Arcadea Group ($1–20M ARR target), and Valsoft.

Thoma Bravo is a comparison name. A founder selling at $12M ARR who is told "this is a Thoma Bravo kind of asset" is being flattered, not given an accurate read on who will actually bid. The accurate read at $12M ARR is Vista Endeavor and the permanent-capital holdcos. Thoma Bravo becomes a real bidder only when the founder clears roughly $20M ARR and the company has the kind of operational profile (recurring revenue, low churn, category leadership) that justifies an Explore-sized cheque.

Once a founder is over $25M ARR, Thoma Bravo is materially in play. Over $50M ARR, the mandate is out of Rivas Will's band entirely and into Discover Fund territory.

Recent deals to cite in founder conversations

The Verint–Calabrio and WWEX–Auctane pattern is worth flagging: when Thoma Bravo is already in a sub-vertical, it buys adjacencies and merges them into the existing platform rather than running each as a standalone. For a founder whose competitor is already in the Thoma Bravo portfolio, the offer is likely to be "join the platform" rather than "be the platform," and the economics reflect that. The HCSS → Nemetschek trade is the other side of that pattern: when the Thoma Bravo-owned platform has reached saturation in its sub-vertical, the sponsor sells into a listed strategic's roll-up, retaining a minority to participate in the combined upside. Rivas Will founders in the Thoma Bravo band should expect both options to be on the table depending on where the sponsor is in its hold cycle.

2026 AI-platform pivot: the Google Cloud partnership

On 15 April 2026, Thoma Bravo and Google Cloud announced a strategic partnership to accelerate AI adoption across Thoma Bravo's 75+ enterprise software portfolio (Google Cloud Press Corner, 15 Apr 2026; Thoma Bravo press release, 15 Apr 2026; Axios Pro, 15 Apr 2026). Portfolio companies will embed Google's Gemini models, Gemini Enterprise agentic-AI platform, and Agent Platform into their product stacks, and distribute via Google Cloud Marketplace. Seven cybersecurity portfolio companies are named in the release — Proofpoint, SailPoint, Darktrace, Ping Identity, Sophos, Imprivata, Exabeam — collectively generating ~$8B in annual revenue, and will co-develop offerings to identify AI-enabled security threats. Axios Pro (citing Bloomberg) reports the project will cost Thoma Bravo "billions over several years."

Orlando Bravo's quoted framing — "This partnership will allow our portfolio companies to rapidly implement leading AI technology from Google Cloud" — is the operator version of the "AI valuations are in a bubble but enterprise software fundamentals are intact" public thesis he has been repeating since mid-2025. The message to founders: Thoma Bravo has chosen a cloud-and-model partner at the portfolio level. A $15–25M ARR vertical SaaS company engaged by Explore in 2026 should expect a post-close integration track that includes an expected Gemini/Agent Platform rollout alongside the usual pricing, CAC, and org-design work. For founders who are evaluating which sponsor to run a process with, the partnership is also a differentiator: Vista is operator-heavy on its own playbook; Thoma Bravo is now operator-heavy plus hyperscaler-aligned.

People

Headquarters

Thoma Bravo is headquartered at 110 N. Wacker Drive, 32nd Floor, Chicago, IL 60606 (Thoma Bravo, Contact). Orlando Bravo operates primarily from Miami, but the firm is not a Miami firm — the SEC filings, the operating team, and the LP-facing infrastructure are in Chicago.

Open questions for the next update

Sources