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Kompella Technologies

Private Equity · Operating Partner Engagement · $30,000–$50,000/month

Private equity CTO leadership, from someone who runs a fund

Fractional CTO for PE operating teams and the portfolio companies they manage — pre-close diligence, post-close value creation, CTO replacement, and multi-portco thematic engagements. Written by a SEBI-licensed alternative investment fund manager, so the diligence lands with the deal team.

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A private equity CTO covers three patterns: pre-close technical due diligence, post-close value-creation execution inside the portfolio company, and CTO replacement during a full-time search. PE engagements run 20–30% above standard fractional tiers, span 6–18 months per portco, and cost $30,000–$50,000/month. We run these as fractional CTO to Landocs Private Equity in Tel Aviv, and as a SEBI-licensed fund manager — which means the diligence memo is written in the language of the investment committee rather than the engineering team.

Engagement Patterns

Four ways PE firms engage us.

Pre-close tech due diligence

Senior architecture and team review before transactions close. Often complementary to specialist DD firms (Crosslake, West Monroe) — we provide a continuous engagement that bridges into post-close work, rather than a one-time DD report.

Post-close value-creation augmentation

Most common pattern. Embedded in the portfolio company for 6–18 months executing the value-creation tech thesis from the diligence report. Cloud migration, security uplift, AI rollout, ERP modernization, M&A integration playbook.

CTO replacement during transition

Portfolio company CTO leaves; the board needs continuity for 6–12 months while running a full-time search. Embedded-tier engagement replaces the departed CTO during the search and helps recruit the permanent replacement.

Multi-portco thematic engagements

One fractional CTO works across 2–4 portcos on a coordinated theme — AI rollout, cybersecurity uplift, post-merger integration, cloud migration playbook. Operating-partner-managed engagement structure.

Two Engagement Models

Firm-level vs. portco-level engagement.

Firm-level engagement

Operating-partner-managed engagement where one fractional CTO works across multiple portfolio companies on coordinated themes (AI rollout, cybersecurity uplift, post-merger integration). The operating partner provides governance and prioritization; the fractional CTO works directly with portco CEOs and engineering leaders. Best for sub-$5B AUM firms with 8–25 active portcos.

Portco-level engagement

Embedded fractional CTO at a single portfolio company for 6–18 months, executing the value-creation thesis from diligence or replacing a departed CTO during a transition. Reports primarily to the portco CEO with dotted-line accountability to the operating partner. Best for portcos under $200M in revenue where a full-time CTO isn't yet justified.

The Difference

Diligence written for the investment committee.

Most technical diligence is written by engineers for engineers. It lists every flaw the reviewer could find, scores the team against a maturity model, and leaves the deal team to work out which of it changes the price. That memo gets skimmed and filed.

A memo that lands separates three things: what changes the valuation, what is fixable inside the hold period and at what cost, and what is actually the reason the asset is available at this price. A monolith is not a finding. A monolith that cannot be split without an eighteen-month rewrite, in a business whose thesis depends on launching three adjacent products inside two years, is a finding — and it belongs in the memo with a number attached.

We write it that way because we sit on the other side of the table too. Ganesh Kompella is Founding Partner and certified fund manager at Tykhe Ventures, running $20M across two funds including a SEBI Alternative Investment Fund Category II, and is fractional CTO to Landocs Private Equity in Tel Aviv. The vocabulary — hold period, value-creation plan, exit readiness, LP reporting — is native rather than translated.

More on the investment practice, including conflict-of-interest boundaries →

Pricing

Premium reflects PE engagement scope.

PE engagements typically run 20–30% above our standard fractional CTO tiers due to scope (deeper engineering teams, stricter timelines, harder deliverables), operating-partner reporting cadence, and the LP-aligned documentation work. Most PE engagements operate at the Embedded tier.

Portco Embedded

$30,000 / month

3+ days/week, 6–18 months

Embedded fractional CTO at a single portfolio company. Value-creation execution, CTO replacement, or exit-readiness work.

Multi-Portco Thematic

$50,000 / month

2–4 portcos, 12 months

One fractional CTO across multiple portcos on a coordinated theme (AI, security, integration). Operating-partner-managed.

Pre-Close DD Support

Project-scoped

2–6 weeks per transaction

Tech and team review on transactions, complementing or substituting for a specialist DD firm. Bridges into post-close work.

Selected Engagements

PE-relevant work we've shipped.

Most PE engagements operate under NDA. The named one below is current; the three public case studies that follow are not PE-backed but demonstrate the value-creation patterns that translate directly. Further PE references available under NDA.

Current engagement · Tel Aviv, Israel

Fractional CTO to Landocs Private Equity

Mandate

Technology leadership across the firm and its portfolio — pre-close technical diligence on transactions and post-close value-creation execution.

Reporting

Direct to the partnership, with portco-level engagement run against the value-creation plan agreed at investment.

Why it works

Diligence and execution by the same person. The findings that go into the memo are the findings someone then has to own after close.

Healthcare SaaS scale

Scaling an EMR platform to 4,000+ US clinics — translatable to PE-backed healthcare SaaS scale playbooks

Cost takeout / value creation

Saved $1M+ at Mercer by killing wrong tech investments — direct fit for PE value-creation theses

Exit readiness

A'alda from founding through Tokyo IPO — exit-readiness patterns for PE hold-period preparation

FAQ

PE-specific questions.

Yes, and the boundary is written down rather than assumed. Tykhe Ventures does not invest in companies where Kompella holds an advisory mandate without disclosing it to both sides first. We take no finder's fees and no success fees tied to a transaction closing — a diligence provider paid more when the deal happens is not a diligence provider. If a conflict exists on a specific deal we say so and step back from the diligence rather than manage around it.
Both, and the reporting line matters. Firm-level engagements are commissioned and governed by the operating partner, with the fractional CTO working across 2–4 portcos on a coordinated theme. Portco-level engagements report primarily to the portco CEO with dotted-line accountability to the operating partner. The second shape works better when the portco team needs to trust the person; the first works better when the sponsor needs consistency across the portfolio.
Yes, increasingly. Operating teams at sub-$5B AUM PE firms in particular use fractional CTOs for portfolio company augmentation rather than hiring full-time CTOs at every portco. The pattern is most common at firms with 8–25 active portfolio companies where staffing a full-time CTO at each is neither budgeted nor feasible.
Tech DD firms (Crosslake, West Monroe, Newforth) produce reports for transaction decisions; fractional CTOs embed in portfolio companies post-close and own outcomes. Most PE firms use both — DD firms for the transaction itself, fractional CTOs for the post-close work where the value-creation thesis actually plays out.
Yes. Multi-portco thematic engagements are increasingly common — one fractional CTO managing AI rollout, cybersecurity uplift, or post-merger integration patterns across 2–4 portcos under operating-partner oversight. Pricing is typically bundled at $40K–$60K/month for the multi-portco scope.
PE engagements run 20–30% above standard fractional CTO tiers due to scope, timeline pressure, and reporting demands. Most PE engagements operate at the Embedded tier ($25K+/month) rather than Advisory or Fractional. Multi-portco engagements bundle pricing.
Yes. Late-cycle PE engagements often focus on exit-readiness: clearing technical debt that would surface during diligence on the next transaction, producing diligence-ready architecture and security documentation, and ensuring the engineering team can defend the asset during exit DD. Typically 12–18 months ahead of expected exit.
Yes. PE engagements typically include monthly operating-partner updates and quarterly LP-aligned tech updates that get aggregated into LP reports. We follow the operating partner's reporting cadence and templates rather than imposing our own.

Operating partner conversation in 30 minutes.

We'll talk through your portfolio, the value-creation thesis, and where embedded fractional CTO leadership fits. No deck, no pitch — just an honest read on whether we're the right shape.

Need the deliverable spec and pricing for a specific deal? Technical due diligence. Venture-stage rather than buyout? Venture capital CTO. Also advising on the family office side? What a family office CTO covers.

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