Deep Dive: Search Reality Check: 6 Learnings from My Search
My personal findings - Alexander Rast from Rast Unternehmensnachfolge
Key Takeaways
M&A can become unexpectedly addictive, even if you come in as an operator-first CEO candidate.
The ETA community is a real force multiplier, reminiscent of the early startup ecosystem (10-15 years ago).
Europe’s micro-/small-cap search process is still uneven, with real gaps in standardization and self-funded “pre-deal” support.
A seller call in the morning, a data room and an indicative offer in the afternoon, and a bank meeting in the evening where you realize: the “rules of the game” can change materially depending on who sits on the capital side of the same deal. That mix of speed, ambiguity, and learning has defined my search far more than I expected a year ago.
My background is management consulting, focused on transformation, efficiency, and restructuring, hands-on, close to operations. For a long time, I assumed my biggest leverage would start after closing, as a CEO driving execution. What surprised me most is how formative the pre-close phase already is.
Today, I’m a self-funded searcher in Bavaria, targeting a healthy SME, ideally craft / technical B2B services (service- and project-oriented), roughly €5-15m revenue and €0.5-1.0m EBIT, with intentional flexibility if the team, market, and setup are compelling.
Three positive surprises
1) I found genuine joy in micro-/small-cap M&A despite being “operator DNA.”
In the past, deal-making felt secondary to me. In search, I realized it’s not a separate world, it’s the prerequisite to good operating leadership. Quickly understanding business models, underwriting risk, and building a financeable structure is demanding and unexpectedly energizing. It will also matter later for add-ons and follow-on acquisitions.
2) ETA community support
I only knew this level of “give-first” culture from the early startup world. Intros, sparring, process know-how, honest feedback, often fast and without hidden agendas. The ETA community reduces isolation, increases speed, and helps you avoid predictable mistakes.
3) The learning curve is steep and it builds real confidence.
Search is intense repetition: prioritizing faster, asking better questions, recognizing patterns, deciding with incomplete information, and communicating clearly. After a few months, your judgment and pace improve noticeably, and so does your confidence in navigating complexity.
Three negative surprises
1) Few standards: professionalism varies widely
Across advisors, platforms, sellers, and banks (and sometimes searchers too). Every process looks different: data rooms, timelines, information quality, decision logic. Some participants are excellent; others are ad hoc. On the banking side, the spread is especially visible in MBI situations without an industry background or “family track record.” It’s part of the game, but it consumes time and energy.
2) The self-funded “pre-deal” phase is structurally underfinanced.
Travel, legal, analysis, tools, advisors, much of it sits with the searcher personally. At the same time, the funding and support logic often doesn’t fit the self-funded reality, even though succession preserves jobs and strengthens local value creation. There’s a real structural gap: early-stage startups are often supported, while ETA/succession typically receives far less attention.
3) A lot of the work is invisible and therefore easily misunderstood.
Without a company logo or obvious weekly “deliverables,” search can look externally like a pause. In reality, it’s full-time: pipeline building, calls, NDAs, analyses, seller visits, models, follow-ups, and networking. If you don’t actively explain it, misconceptions are almost guaranteed, and that can be tiring.
Why I’m still convinced and what we’re doing to improve it
These experiences are exactly why I’m part of the Search Fund Hub team and why I launched the “Die Mittelstandspiloten” podcast with Michael Müller: to increase information flow, transparency, and professionalism, and ultimately to enable more successful transactions in the European Mittelstand.
Search isn’t just the path to a company, it’s already part of the entrepreneurial education. And that’s what makes it, despite the friction, so valuable.
Insight of the week
A RollUpEurope profile of Opera Investment Partners is showing that in Europe, the hard part isn’t finding deals, it’s rejecting almost all of them. If you screen 1,100+ opportunities and only invest in 23, the message is that most deals fail basic survivability tests. That has three clean implications for ETA/search-backed buying:
A big pipeline is not an advantage by itself. The advantage is having a repeatable way to say “no” quickly and correctly. If you’re not killing 95-99% of what you see, you’re either not seeing enough, or your filters are too soft.
Europe is still less “systematized” than the US. Independent sponsors are a smaller share of the market, so playbooks (lenders, advisors, governance, pattern recognition) are less standardized. That creates opportunity, but also means mistakes compound faster because the ecosystem is less forgiving.
The right underwriting posture is “what kills this?” Not “why is this great?” Most bad outcomes come from one hidden fragility (customer concentration, key-person dependence, working capital, covenants) that breaks before the upside plan has time to matter.
The edge is not access to deals, it’s disciplined rejection and downside-first underwriting.
Reference
RollUpEurope’s Vol. 12 interview-style write-up on Opera (pages 1-4).
Deal watch
Launches
𝗡𝗮𝘃𝗮𝗱𝗼𝗿 𝗣𝗮𝗿𝘁𝗻𝗲𝗿𝘀 - 𝗗𝗘
Navador Partners GmbH was launched as an integrated investment platform focused on German Mittelstand succession situations. The firm also plans to selectively support SMEs in small- and mid-cap buy-and-build strategies. Link
𝗘𝗻𝗰𝗿𝘂𝘇𝗮𝗱𝗼 𝗣𝗮𝗿𝘁𝗻𝗲𝗿𝘀 - 𝗣𝗧
Portugal-based Encruzado Partners (Sónia Vaz and Ricardo Cardoso) officially launched. The vehicle targets the acquisition and long-term operation of a single Portuguese SME with strong fundamentals and sustainable growth potential. Link
𝗩𝗼𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗮 𝗖𝗮𝗽𝗶𝘁𝗮𝗹 - 𝗜𝗧
Italy-based Volata Capital, founded by Daniel Martínez, has launched as a sector-agnostic search fund targeting Italian family-owned SMEs. The vehicle is backed by a group of experienced long-term investors, including Legacy Partners. Link
Fundraising
𝗟𝗶𝗻𝗲𝗮𝗴𝗲 𝗣𝗮𝗿𝘁𝗻𝗲𝗿𝘀 - 𝗗𝗘
Germany-based Lineage Partners reached final close of Lineage Partners Fund I at €25m, hitting its hard cap and closing oversubscribed. The fund positions itself as the first institutional “Fund of Searchers” in Germany, investing across Europe with a long-term, operator-focused approach. Link
𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗿𝗸𝗲 𝗨𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗲𝗵𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘀𝗻𝗮𝗰𝗵𝗳𝗼𝗹𝗴𝗲 𝗚𝗺𝗯𝗛 - 𝗗𝗘
Starke Unternehmensnachfolge GmbH announced the successful close of its fundraising and has begun its search for a German B2B SME with €5-50m revenue. Current focus areas include building technology-related crafts and B2B services. Link
„Die Mittelstandspiloten“ Podcast
In our podcast “Die Mittelstandspiloten”, Michael and I share candid learnings from the search journey and practical insights into sourcing, diligence, financing, and what it really takes to acquire and at some point also operate a Mittelstand business. If you want a real-world view on ETA in Germany, this podcast is a great starting point. Link
Was this email forwarded to you? Subscribe here to get ETA Europe delivered to your inbox every Thursday