AI diligence across 9 portfolio companies. ~€8M from 2 launched programmes.
Portfolio IT and AI diligence for mid-market private equity. Same operator across pre-investment, value creation, and exit readiness.
Three situations where the work pays directly.
Pre-investment diligence
You're looking at an asset where IT, security, AI governance, or cloud spend could materially affect value. Three to five days of focused diligence, a readiness heatmap, quantified priority use cases, and a 100-day plan for the post-close quarter.
Portfolio value creation
One or more portfolio companies are stuck on IT, security, or AI investments that should be generating returns and aren't. I step in as interim CIDO/CIO to unstick the operating model, vendor controls, and accountability, sometimes for a single portfolio company, sometimes across a platform.
Exit readiness
A portfolio company is heading toward sale. Buyers will dig into IT maturity, security posture, AI governance, and cloud cost discipline. I make those diligence areas into clean answers instead of last-minute scrambles.
Work done at PE scale.
Shared controls, cleaner exits
Built a shared control library, standard KPIs, common vendor standards, board dashboards, incident playbooks, DR testing, and a light operating model for local IT leaders ahead of planned exits. Outcome: ~€3M run-rate savings through tool consolidation, buyer diligence materially easier in three exits, high-risk pentest findings across the portfolio fell 63%.
Interim CIDO/CIO. 5 AI use cases live in 9 months.
Interim CIDO/CIO mandate after separate business units had started buying AI tools with no governance, no shared data standards, and no credible ROI case for the board. Built the board AI thesis, operating model, vendor controls, and phased roadmap across support, bid writing, finance, and service delivery. Outcome: 5 AI use cases in production inside 9 months, 18% reduction in back-office effort, ~€5M run-rate savings, board-approved 24-month AI investment plan.
AI diligence heatmap. ~€8M from 2 launched programmes.
Led AI diligence and value-creation planning across 9 portfolio companies to identify which assets could realise measurable benefit in the first 12 months. Produced an AI readiness heatmap, quantified priority use cases, and wrote 100-day plans for the top four businesses. Outcome: two of the nine portfolio companies launched programmes within a quarter and together identified roughly ~€8M in first-year run-rate value.
~€8M of stalled pipeline reopened
Interim/deputy CISO/CTO/CIO mandate after enterprise deals stalled on security reviews, AWS and Azure costs had drifted, and control ownership was fragmented across the group. Unified identity, logging, endpoint security, SOC 2 Type II and ISO 27001 programmes, cloud landing zones, vendor risk, and board reporting. Outcome: reopened ~€8M of stalled pipeline, cloud spend down 19%, critical vulnerabilities older than 30 days down 92%, cyber insurance renewal held flat instead of a projected 38% increase.
The full engagement portfolio is available on request.
Priced to the portfolio.
Portfolio IT and AI Diligence Sprint: 250-350K DKK per engagement, scoped to portfolio complexity. 3-5 intensive days plus 1-2 weeks of deliverables. Typical scope covers one platform (2-4 portfolio companies) or one pre-investment target with related portfolio context. Exact pricing is set after an introductory call with the deal team.
Behzad Motaghi
15+ years of IT, security, and AI leadership across Innofactor, Crayon, and Sentia. IT, security, cloud, governance, and AI advisory mandates spanning growing companies through enterprise scale. Azure Solutions Architect Expert. PRINCE2 Practitioner. Based in Denmark, working across the Nordics, UK, and EEA. Deep work in PE contexts: interim CIDO/CIO at a 1,800-staff PE-backed platform, AI diligence across 9 portfolio companies for one PE platform, cross-portfolio controls and exit-readiness work for an 8-company PE platform.
Have a portfolio situation worth a conversation?
Thirty minutes with me and your deal team. I'll tell you whether a diligence sprint would move the number, what it would cost, and how fast it could start.