Main Capital closes €5.25B across two enterprise-software funds

Main Capital Partners, the Netherlands-based enterprise-software private equity firm, has closed two new funds totalling €5.25 billion. Main Capital IX closed at a €4 billion hard cap and Main Foundation III at a €1.25 billion hard cap — together more than double their predecessors and lifting Main's assets under management above €12 billion. The capital will back profitable software businesses across the Benelux, DACH, the Nordics, France and North America, and — for the first time — the UK.

The raise landed despite AI-driven volatility in the software market, with LPs showing strong conviction: the re-up rate exceeded 120%, with continued support from existing backers including Hamilton Lane. New commitments came largely from the US, Asia and the Middle East — sovereign wealth funds, public pension funds and insurers such as the State Teachers' Retirement System of Ohio, the Korean Teachers' Credit Union and AkademikerPension. Main points to a 23-year track record of 38 exits at a 4.7x weighted-average gross return and a loss rate below 0.5% as the basis for that trust.

Enterprise software remains one of the asset classes where private equity can still raise at scale. Main will keep to its lower mid-market strategy — equity tickets of €5–150 million in profitable, resilient software companies built into larger cross-border groups via organic growth and targeted M&A — while expanding into UK platform investments. The firm runs roughly 100 people across The Hague, Düsseldorf, Stockholm, Antwerp, Paris and an affiliate office in Boston.