Portfolio visibility into engineering spend
Engineering is the largest cost in your tech portfolio companies, but the hardest to evaluate. Flowstate standardises how you measure, compare, and optimise engineering investment across your portfolio.
Global PE buyout activity demands better operational visibility
Technology companies represent a third of PE deal value
Operational excellence drives nearly half of PE value creation
The portfolio challenge
Operational excellence drives 47% of PE value creation
Yet most operating partners have no standardised way to measure engineering efficiency across portfolio companies. Each co reports differently.
Tech due diligence is a black box
Engineering teams present polished narratives, but you cannot independently verify team productivity, cost efficiency, or investment allocation without deep technical access.
No standardised metrics across portfolio
Cost per engineer, R&D spend ratio, CapEx attribution -- every portfolio company measures these differently, making comparison impossible.
Compare engineering efficiency across your portfolio
Standardised metrics across every portfolio company. No more bespoke spreadsheets from each CTO.
Alpha
Strong- Cost per engineer
- £142K$179K
- R&D ratio
- 32%
- CapEx rate
- 41%
- Efficiency score
- 87 / 100
Beta
Review- Cost per engineer
- £168K$212K
- R&D ratio
- 28%
- CapEx rate
- 24%
- Efficiency score
- 62 / 100
Gamma
Strong- Cost per engineer
- £135K$170K
- R&D ratio
- 35%
- CapEx rate
- 38%
- Efficiency score
- 81 / 100
Delta
At Risk- Cost per engineer
- £195K$246K
- R&D ratio
- 22%
- CapEx rate
- 15%
- Efficiency score
- 38 / 100
How Flowstate helps
Standardised engineering metrics across your portfolio, deployed in weeks not months.
- Cross-portfolio dashboards
- Compare engineering cost efficiency, team utilisation, and investment allocation across every portfolio company from a single view.
- Standardised metrics
- Consistent definitions for cost per engineer, R&D ratio, and operational efficiency that work regardless of what tools each company uses.
- CapEx optimisation
- Maximise capitalisation of engineering work across the portfolio. Identify companies under-capitalising and the EBITDA impact of getting it right.
- Due diligence accelerator
- Pre-acquisition, get a clear picture of engineering spend efficiency. Post-acquisition, onboard the company in weeks and start tracking immediately.
"We deployed Flowstate across four portfolio companies in six weeks. For the first time, I can compare engineering cost efficiency on a like-for-like basis across the portfolio."
See inside the engineering black box
Give your operating partners and portfolio companies the tools to measure, compare, and optimise engineering investment.