In today’s private equity landscape, finding the right deal is harder (and more important) than ever.
The market is crowded. The data is incomplete. And the best opportunities? They rarely make it to the open market.
Private companies aren’t required to share financials, ownership structures, or performance metrics. That means deal teams are often flying blind spending hours chasing clarity that never comes.
Add in relationship-driven access, fragmented data, and companies that may not be ready to transact, and sourcing becomes more of an art than a repeatable process.
The result: real deals are out there, but they’re harder to find, harder to price, and harder to close.
That’s why the tools you use matter.
Whether you’re targeting founder-owned businesses, sponsor-backed companies, or niche verticals, the strength of your sourcing platform can define your pipeline.
In this article, we’re breaking down five of the top deal sourcing databases private equity firms are using to get ahead in 2025. By the end of this, you’ll know that each one brings something different to the table and which one fits your strategy best.
PitchBook helps deal teams move faster by combining timely financial data with tools for identifying companies that align with specific investment strategies. Whether you're screening by valuation, revenue, or capital raised, the platform makes it easy to surface companies ready for funding or acquisition. With insights into fund portfolios and holding periods, it’s built to support smarter targeting and more efficient pipeline management.
Best for: financial data and identifying companies ready for investment
Grata is designed to help private equity firms uncover hard-to-find companies that align with their investment thesis. With a proprietary search engine and access to over 16 million private businesses, it allows users to search based on strategy, business model, and key features. For deal teams focused on uncovering overlooked opportunities and getting ahead of the market, Grata offers a more modern way to source.
Best for: Finding proprietary deals in the middle market
Sourcescrub helps deal teams build targeted pipelines by aggregating private company data from events, directories, and industry sources. With access to over 16 million companies and tools for identifying conference attendees, it’s built for outbound strategies and sector-specific outreach. For firms focused on market mapping, direct sourcing, and timely outreach, SourceScrub brings structure to early-stage origination.
Best for: List-based sourcing and market mapping
Dakota takes a different approach. Built specifically for investment teams, the Dakota PortCo database includes over 114k sponsor-backed private companies, each one curated with consistent sector, industry, sub-industry, and sub/sub-industry detail. This level of accuracy allows deal teams to quickly build highly targeted lists without the usual cleanup or guesswork.
In addition to structured categorization, each company profile includes executive contact information, helping teams move efficiently from research to outreach. And because Dakota is built on Salesforce, every note, report, and update stays connected to give teams a seamless experience across research and relationship management.
“The current tools are good, but they still require deal teams to do a lot of extra work. We spent years getting the accuracy and structure right so our users don’t have to,” said Gui Costin, CEO of Dakota.
Best for: Sponsor-backed companies, curated sector data, and integrated workflows
Preqin offers broad coverage of private companies, sponsor-backed deals, and capital flows, making it a trusted platform for firms that need both company profiles and fund-level visibility. With data on ownership, valuations, deal history, and financial health, it’s well-suited for early-stage due diligence, competitive analysis, and market mapping across the private capital landscape.
Best for: End-to-end visibility across companies, deals, and private capital flows
Which Private Equity Deal Sourcing Is Right for You?
Every private equity firm has its own approach to deal sourcing, and the best platform is the one that aligns with your workflow, target profile, and team structure.
If you’re looking for sponsor-backed companies with clean, highly accurate industry categorization, and you want to move faster with less friction, Dakota is built to give you a head start.
For more information on Dakota’s Portfolio Company data, book a demo of Dakota here!
