S&P Global's $1.8B Bet to Map the Private Market Universe

NEW YORK, NY – November 25, 2025 – S&P Global’s announcement today that it has finalized its $1.8 billion acquisition of With Intelligence is far more than a routine M&A headline. It’s a decisive move in an escalating arms race among financial data titans to chart the last great frontier of the global economy: the private markets. This deal isn't just about buying a competitor; it's a strategic land grab for the proprietary data, relationship intelligence, and workflow tools that govern trillions of dollars in alternative assets, a sector long defined by its opacity.

For years, public markets have been meticulously mapped and analyzed, with data flowing in real-time. Private markets—encompassing everything from venture capital and private equity to private credit and real estate—have remained comparatively shadowy. S&P Global's acquisition signals a fundamental belief that this is changing, and that the firm that provides the most comprehensive map will hold an unassailable advantage. As President and CEO Martina Cheung noted, the deal is a “significant step forward” in providing “essential intelligence” for a rapidly expanding landscape. The real story, however, lies in why this landscape is expanding so fast and what it takes to illuminate it.

The New Frontier: Why Private Markets Are Worth Billions

The tectonic plates of global finance are shifting. In the years following the 2008 financial crisis, institutional investors, hungry for returns in a persistent low-interest-rate environment, began a historic pivot. The traditional 60/40 stock-and-bond portfolio, once the bedrock of asset allocation, proved insufficient. This sparked a gold rush into alternative investments, transforming them from a niche allocation into a core pillar of institutional strategy.

The numbers are staggering. Industry leaders like BlackRock project that assets in private markets alone will swell to $20 trillion by 2030, while S&P Global's own research suggests the broader alternative asset class could approach $40 trillion within the decade. This isn't just about more money flowing into the same old strategies. Private capital is diversifying into growth equity, infrastructure, and specialized credit funds, touching nearly every corner of the modern economy, from tech startups to sustainable energy projects.

This explosive growth has created a critical business problem: a severe information deficit. Unlike public companies with mandated disclosures, private firms and funds operate behind a veil. Tracking deal flow, understanding fund performance, identifying active investors, and benchmarking against peers is an exercise in painstaking, relationship-driven intelligence gathering. It is precisely this information gap—and the immense value in closing it—that makes a company like With Intelligence a $1.8 billion prize.

Charting the Opaque: S&P Global's Play for Data Dominance

Before the acquisition, S&P Global was already a formidable player in private markets through its flagship Capital IQ Pro platform, which provides deep data on millions of private companies. However, this data largely focused on the companies themselves. What With Intelligence brings to the table is a different, and arguably more valuable, layer of insight: the ecosystem around the deals.

Founded in 1998, With Intelligence built its reputation on sourcing hard-to-reach, proprietary data that doesn't show up in standard filings. This includes everything from granular fund performance metrics to, crucially, intelligence on investor allocation intentions. Knowing which pension fund is looking to increase its private credit exposure, or which endowment is searching for a new real estate manager, is the lifeblood of asset raising. This is the kind of forward-looking, relationship-based intelligence that gives clients a competitive edge.

Furthermore, With Intelligence had been on its own acquisition spree, backed by seller Motive Partners. It integrated companies like SPS (Sutton Place Strategies), a provider of granular private equity deal and M&A data, and The Deal, a source for M&A news and intelligence. This means S&P Global isn't just acquiring a single data provider; it's absorbing a curated portfolio of specialized intelligence assets. Now, a Capital IQ Pro user can not only analyze a target company but also see which sponsors are most active in that sector, which lenders finance such deals, and even how competitive the typical sale process is. This combination transforms a data platform into an end-to-end workflow solution for deal origination, due diligence, and relationship management.

The Consolidation Game and the Integration Challenge

S&P Global's move is not happening in a vacuum. It is the latest and one of the largest shots fired in an industry-wide consolidation war. Earlier this year, BlackRock reportedly acquired data provider Preqin for over £2.5 billion, while competitor Bloomberg announced a strategic partnership with AI-powered data platform Daphne Technologies. Every major player, from FactSet to PitchBook, is racing to bolster its private market offerings, either through acquisition or internal development.

This transaction also highlights the sophisticated role of specialist private equity firms like Motive Partners. In just two years, Motive transformed With Intelligence from a strong independent player into an integrated data powerhouse by funding strategic add-on acquisitions, before executing a highly profitable exit. It's a case study in modern value creation, where a financial sponsor acts as a strategic architect, building an asset perfectly tailored to the needs of a corporate giant like S&P Global.

The next, and most critical, phase is integration. The challenge for S&P Global now is to seamlessly weave With Intelligence's distinct datasets and platforms into its own sprawling ecosystem. Unlocking the full $1.8 billion in value depends on creating a user experience where proprietary fund data, M&A intelligence, and S&P’s existing company information coexist harmoniously. If executed well, the synergy could provide clients with an unparalleled, holistic view of the private capital landscape. If handled poorly, it could result in siloed products and frustrated customers. For business leaders and investors, the outcome will determine the future benchmark for market intelligence in the alternatives space.

Ultimately, this acquisition is a bet that data and analytics will professionalize and institutionalize the private markets in the same way they did for public equities decades ago. By combining their respective strengths, S&P Global aims to provide the definitive operating system for this evolution. For the thousands of fund managers, institutional investors, and corporate strategists navigating this complex world, the tools they use to find opportunities and manage risk are about to become significantly more powerful.