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Recent advances in AI are complicating the exit outlook for private equity firms with long-held portfolio companies that operate in the software industry.

The median hold time for North America-based private equity portfolio companies at exit was 5.4 years as of the fourth quarter of 2025 and just five years in the technology sector, which includes the software industry, according to With Intelligence data.

Since 2015, software company acquirers have paid a median multiple of 4.1x trailing-12-month revenue, according to 451 Research M&A KnowledgeBase data.

Potential strategic acquirers for application software businesses are, in many cases, listed software businesses that have recently seen their stock prices drop.

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Recent advances in AI are complicating the exit outlook for private equity firms with long-held portfolio companies that operate in the software industry.

More than 27% of active private equity portfolio…