Enjoy a delicious lunch after registering, with plenty of opportunities for networking.

The day kicks off with a welcome from M&A Community Manager Elisa Houweling and Danny Bosker, Partner at KPMG Corporate Finance. Followed by the panel discussion: 

Private equity is at a turning point. After years defined by multiple expansion, quick exits and scale-driven growth, the landscape is changing. With longer holding periods and fewer straightforward exits, operational value creation is becoming increasingly important.

In this panel, leading private equity leaders will address one central question: 'What will determine success for private equity between 2026 and 2028?'

• Is this the end of the traditional PE model?
• Will sector specialization become the winning strategy, or will scale and diversification remain an advantage?
• And how can firms demonstrate real value creation in today’s market?

A sharp discussion on focus versus scale, generalist versus specialist, and the new PE playbook that will shape the industry in the years ahead.

M&A activity has slowed against a backdrop of macro uncertainty, rising inflation and challenging debt markets, leading to more selective (private equity) exit markets and continued pressure on distributions. In response, GPs are taking a more active approach to managing liquidity, ownership, and capital structure. We discuss how transaction, financing and fund-level solutions are evolving to support value creation and deliver outcomes in a more complex and volatile M&A and financing market.

In this session, Nina Kielman, Sophie van Lanschot and Joost den Engelsman of NautaDutilh take a practical deep dive into management incentive plans in a Private Equity context.

Management incentives are a key value driver in PE investments - but getting them right requires balancing commercial objectives, legal design and tax efficiency. In an interactive and practice-focused session, we will discuss:

• The incentive structures we most commonly see in today’s market, including sweet equity, rollover arrangements and other (equity-based) incentives;
• Key market trends, and how PE sponsors and management teams are adapting their incentive packages;
• Upcoming tax developments and what they mean for the design, sustainability and risk profile of management incentive plans; and
• Lessons learned from practice: what works, what doesn’t, and the classic do’s & don’ts when structuring and implementing incentive plans.

This session combines legal and tax insights with hands-on experience from deal practice. Expect concrete examples, practical takeaways and plenty of room for discussion—perfect for anyone involved in structuring, negotiating or operating management incentive plans in Private Equity.

The EU Pay Transparency & Equal Pay Session brings Private Equity leaders together to examine how the EU Pay Transparency Directive is reshaping deal risk and value. As regulatory scrutiny increases, undisclosed pay gaps can materially impact cash flows, liabilities and exit outcomes. This session focuses on how equal pay can be embedded into due diligence and value creation strategies, enabling investors and their portfolio companies to quantify risk, prevent value leakage and strengthen equity cases through data-driven equal pay analysis.

The Exit Readiness Round Table is an exclusive, high energy session for Private Equity leaders seeking to maximise exit value in an increasingly complex deal environment. As buyers assess margin resilience, PxQ dynamics, scalability and carve out complexity, expectations for real time visibility and defensible data have materially increased. The session focuses on how disciplined strategic preparation, targeted evidence planning and focused organisational execution enable assets to withstand heightened scrutiny and accelerate towards a value maximised exit. Drawing on real transaction experience, the discussion explores how to get ahead of buyer concerns, eliminate value leakage, and use exit readiness as a decisive lever for valuation command and deal control.

KPMG will host this roundtable session, which is by invitation only.

A chance to recharge, engage in meaningful conversations, and expand your network.

We are at an inflection point in the AI market for PE companies and the AI race to deploy AI productively across all Portfolio Companies has finally started for real!

On one hand, AI models continue to double in performance/cost every 4-7 months, and more than $1B is invested every day in AI data centers to cope with sky-rocketing demand for tokens. On the other, the effective adoption within enterprises across the world is growing more modestly. The gap between what is technically possible to do today, and what is actually happening within companies is growing exponentially. This creates significant opportunities for disruption for faster moving start-ups and also the “least slowly” moving large enterprises in any industry.

But overcoming these execution barriers requires a deeper understanding of what is holding the people within the organizations back, and a different change management approach than what has traditionally worked for IT-driven transformations. In the last 6 months, however, we have seen a small groups of companies emerge that have managed to capture measurable benefits of AI at scale and a massive shift in the ecosystem, with PE companies and AI companies partnering with professional services firms in the race to unlock this value.

For PE companies, there are potential benefits of AI across the entire deal-lifecycle, from deal screening and diligence, to integration of new assets, but the real price - Portfolio Company EBITDA uplift during the holding period – has largely been lagging so far, beyond coding and enhancing products with AI. With the major investments of some of the largest PE Firms in the world, together with Anthropic and OpenAI, this is likely about to change rapidly. To analyze the opportunity at stake, and the real barriers holding back value-realization, KPMG has built digital twins of 17 million companies and successfully tested a new change management approach on 30+ companies in Europe.

Leadership quality is among the strongest predictors of value creation in PE - and among the least systematically addressed. In this session, Odgers and +pascal examine where the gap sits across the deal lifecycle, and what firms, their portfolio leaders, and PE professionals can do about it and for themselves.

What really happens behind the numbers, strategies, and boardroom doors?

At the Private Equity Summit 2026, Jeroen Smit takes you beyond the spreadsheet. In his signature sharp and investigative style, he exposes where carefully crafted plans collide with reality, how decision-making truly unfolds under pressure, and which patterns keep repeating,even in a so-called “new era.”

Drawing on compelling case studies and deep analysis, he challenges the industry to reflect:
is this truly a new playbook, or are we making the same mistakes in a different form?

A thought-provoking and insightful closing keynote that will reshape how you view value creation, leadership, and success in private equity.

Wrap up the day with great company, drinks, and bites at Linda’s Corner.