Competitive intelligence (CI) can be especially valuable to private equity (PE) and venture capital (VC) firms, which often operate somewhat in the dark within their industry segments. Holdings in newly-forming or niche industries have few public companies or established business models to provide adequate references for benchmarking and other meaningful insights.

Given this reality and the goals of private investors, PE and VC firms have a shallow understanding of their portfolio companies’ key competitors, limited to core strengths and weaknesses and basic knowledge of product or service lines. They lack detailed information on products, key employees, clients, financial performance and other areas. Good CI gathering can fill in the gaps, offering the context needed to foster ideas and support decisions to identify the best new investment opportunities and maximize the value of their existing portfolio.

How can CI enhance the value of private investment portfolios?  Read the full posting here.

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Photo of John DiGilio John DiGilio

As an information professional and visionary, John DiGilio has over 20 years of large law firm library and legal information vendor experience. He has proudly been affiliated with some of the largest law firms and information vendors in the industry. An award winning…

As an information professional and visionary, John DiGilio has over 20 years of large law firm library and legal information vendor experience. He has proudly been affiliated with some of the largest law firms and information vendors in the industry. An award winning writer and popular speaker, John believes in the value of information and the power it can bring when harnessed wisely and efficiently.

John is the Firmwide Director of Library Services for Sidley Austin LLP. He has written for numerous regional and national publications as well as taught college and graduate courses in such topics as business ethics, e-commerce, fair employment practices, research methodology and business law.