Capital signal research

Firm list in. Portfolio companies and a thesis extract out. Then qualify each portco against 50–500 manufacturing. A logo on a sponsor site is an SG_021 hypothesis, not a confirmed owner and not a reason to say "your PE firm will make you buy an ERP."

This page expands the capital pass in ERP signal research. It does not mint signals. Sponsor ownership still has to be confirmed on the call when it would change the frame.

Two jobs, in order:

1. Universe — a large list of GPs, independent sponsors, SBICs, BDCs, search funds, and family offices that buy operating companies in our size band.
2. Portfolios + thesis — what each one owns now, what they say they buy (check size, sector, geography), and which names look like plants.

A paid origination product (PitchBook, Preqin, Grata) can skip most of job 1 and a lot of job 2. DIY scrape is job 1 from public filings, then Firecrawl/Browser Run on /portfolio.

Tools

Tool	Agent surface	Use for
Cloudflare Browser Run	/markdown, /json, /links, /screenshot	JS portfolio grids, logo walls without names.
Firecrawl	/v2/search, /v2/map, /v2/scrape, /v2/crawl	Find /portfolio, extract company names, news of acquisitions.
Exa	/search includeDomains, /contents	"Acquired by {GP}," add-on announcements.
EDGAR / data.sec.gov	Company search, full-text, bulk ADV	BDCs' schedules of investments; Form ADV adviser universe.
IAPD	adviserinfo.sec.gov	One-adviser lookup; private funds on Form ADV.
SBA SBIC directory	Public HTML	Licensed lower-middle-market funds.
PitchBook / Preqin / Grata	Vendor UI + CSV/API if we subscribe	Skip scrape. Export GP list, portfolios, deals, thesis.
ZoomInfo	Parent / ultimate parent, employees	Identity after a portco name is known. Not ownership proof.

POST https://api.firecrawl.dev/v2/{search|map|scrape}
POST https://api.cloudflare.com/client/v4/accounts/<accountId>/browser-rendering/{markdown|json|links}

Default loop: Buy a file when the job is "every middle-market manufacturer with a sponsor." Scrape when the job is "this GP's current portfolio" or we do not have a seat yet.

Context

At 50–500 employees the "board" is often a banker. When a sponsor is in the cap table, the clock changes: hold period, reporting pack, add-ons, professional CEO/CFO (SG_006 / SG_007). That is SG_021. Love of client: a sponsor is not a threat. It is a different proof (speed, auditability) and a different no (they may already have a preferred systems integrator).

Who actually buys plants in this band

Mega-buyout names (Blackstone, KKR control deals) rarely own a 80-person molder as a platform. The universe that matters:

Buyer type	Typical check	Why they show up at 50–500	Where they hide
Lower-middle-market PE	~$5–75M equity	Platform or add-on manufacturer	AIC-ish, PEI 300 tail, their own /portfolio
Independent sponsor	Deal-by-deal	One plant at a time; thin website	ACG, Axial, ZoomInfo titles
SBIC	SBA-levered	Mandate to do smaller US deals	SBA directory
BDC / direct lender	Credit, not always control	Shows who just levered a deal	EDGAR 10-K schedule of investments
Search fund / ETA	Very small	Owner retirement, 20–150 people	Searchfunder, Stanford/IESE lists
Family office	Quiet, long hold	Succession, no PE clock	FINTRX (paid); almost invisible free
Regional bank / ABL / equipment lender	Revolver, machine note	Not equity; still a capital window	UCC-1, tombstones

Do not treat a BDC credit as PE control. Record capital_event: lender vs sponsor. Only the latter is SG_021.

1. Massive lists of PE firms (job 1)

Free (start here)

Source	URL / handle	What you get	Agent note
Form ADV bulk	SEC Investment Adviser data sets on sec.gov data research / adviserinfo	Every SEC-registered adviser; private funds on Schedule D (7.B)	Best free GP universe. Filter private fund + United States. Exempt reporting advisers are thinner.
IAPD	adviserinfo.sec.gov	One firm: AUM, funds, CRD	Use after bulk, or to confirm a scrape hit.
SBA SBIC directory	sba.gov “find an SBIC”	Licensed funds, many LMM	Built for our check size. Scrape the directory, then each fund site.
American Investment Council	investmentcouncil.org members	Large-firm member list	Incomplete for true LMM; still a seed.
PEI 300 (league-table articles)	peievents.com / magazine roundups	Named GPs by capital raised	Copy the names; ranking is not a portfolio.
Wikipedia	“List of private equity firms”	Seed names	Noisy. Dedup against ADV.
ACG chapters	acg.org	Middle-market deal professionals	Directories often gated. Chapter event attendee PDFs sometimes public.
Invest Europe / similar trade bodies	Member lists	EU GPs	Use if the plant or parent is EU.
Crunchbase (free tier)	crunchbase.com	Some investors + a few portcos	Coverage is VC-heavy. Do not trust as PE-complete.

Form ADV is the closest thing to a “dump of all PE firms” that does not require a contract. It will include hedge funds, fund-of-funds, and real estate. Keep rows whose fund type or narrative says private equity / buyout / growth / mezzanine, then keep those whose website thesis says manufacturing / industrial / business services and lower middle market.

Paid (buy the file when DIY cost exceeds a seat)

Product	Who it’s for	What we would actually export	Does it “do the scrape for us”?
PitchBook	Deal origination, bankers	Investors by strategy, AUM, portfolio companies, deals, employees, NAICS-ish	Yes for portfolios and thesis. Standard buy.
Preqin Pro	Fundraising / LP research	GPs, funds, performance, some portcos	Strong on firms and funds; portco depth often behind PitchBook.
Grata (SourceScrub)	PE origination	Web-derived private companies, employee estimates, PE ownership flags, filters	Yes — this is the product that already scrapes the web so we do not have to map 2,000 /portfolio pages. Closest to “pay them instead of Firecrawl.”
S&P Capital IQ	Corporates, banks	Ownership trees, transactions	Yes for who owns whom once you have a legal name.
Moody’s Orbis (BvD)	International ownership	Ultimate parent, % ownership	Best legal ownership graph, weaker on “thesis.”
FactSet / Mergerstat	Deal teams	M&A, advisors	Event stream, not a pretty portco list.
PrivCo	Private-company financials	Estimates, some investors	Secondary.
Crunchbase Pro	Startups	Rounds, investors	Weak on traditional buyout manufacturing.
Gain.pro	EU mid-market	Private companies + ownership	If we hunt EU plants.
FINTRX / FOX	Family offices	FO names, sometimes holdings	Only if we seriously chase family offices.
Axial	Sell-side / independent sponsors	Introductions, not a dump	Membership network, not a scrape substitute.
ZoomInfo (already in stack)	Sales	Parent fields, headcount	Use to resolve a name. Do not use as the PE universe.

Practical recommendation: if the job is a repeatable list of PE-backed manufacturers in US 50–500, buy Grata or PitchBook and stop. DIY scrape is for (a) we do not have a seat yet, (b) a GP is too small to be in PitchBook, (c) we want the thesis page wording, (d) we are refreshing one sponsor this week.

Grata vs PitchBook: Grata is “find me unknown plants on the internet, including who might own them.” PitchBook is “this GP, these deals, this financial history.” Many origination teams hold both.

2. What they invest in (thesis)

Do not infer thesis from the GP’s famous name. Read the criteria page.

Firecrawl map:

POST /v2/map
{ "url": "https://{gp-apex}", "search": "portfolio strategy criteria approach investments thesis manufacturing" }

/json schema:

{
  "gp_name": "",
  "gp_domain": "",
  "url": "",
  "retrieved_at": "",
  "strategies": ["buyout | growth | add_on | distressed | mezz | unknown"],
  "sectors_stated": [],
  "geographies": [],
  "revenue_range": null,
  "ebitda_range": null,
  "equity_check": null,
  "employee_hint": null,
  "add_ons_mentioned": false,
  "hold_period_years": null,
  "manufacturing_fit": "yes | no | unclear",
  "size_band_fit": "under_50 | 50_500 | 500_plus | unclear"
}

manufacturing_fit: yes and size_band_fit: 50_500 → scrape portfolio. Otherwise keep the GP on a skip list (mega-cap, real estate, software-only, healthcare services-only, etc.).

3. Portfolio companies (job 2)

3.1 Scrape the sponsor site

Common paths (still resolve via /map, do not guess only):

/portfolio /companies /investments /current-investments
/our-companies /platform-companies /prior-investments

Extract:

{
  "gp_domain": "",
  "portfolio_url": "",
  "status": "ok | blocked | empty_logos | not_found",
  "companies": [
    {
      "name": "",
      "is_current": true,
      "sector_on_page": null,
      "hq_on_page": null,
      "year_invested": null,
      "url_on_page": null,
      "add_on_of": null
    }
  ]
}

If the page is a logo wall with no names, Browser Run /json plus /screenshot. If names still fail, skip that GP or use PitchBook.

Realized / “prior” portfolios are not current SG_021. Keep them in a separate list (they still know the space; they are not the owner).

Then resolve each name to a domain with Research §1. ZoomInfo for headcount. Qualify process (extrusion, molding, machining) before anyone calls.

3.2 Free sources that already named the companies

Use these when the GP site is empty or JS-blocked.

Source	Artifact	Kind
BDC 10-K / 10-Q “Schedule of Investments”	EDGAR. Company name, industry, cost, sometimes HQ	lender (usually). Still a capital window; map to a domain.
PR Newswire / Business Wire	"{GP} acquires {Co}" / "add-on to {platform}"	SG_018 + SG_021
PE Hub / Buyouts / The Middle Market	Deal briefs	Same, often paywalled — search snippets may be enough to name both sides
Economic development + local paper	“sold to a private equity firm”	Confirm GP name before SG_021
UCC-1	Lender name if the GP’s credit arm filed	Window, not equity
Company about/history page	“backed by,” “partnered with”	Weak; confirm on GP site

EDGAR search pattern:

site:sec.gov "schedule of investments" (manufacturing OR "plastic" OR machining)

Then scrape the filing HTML/XML. Cap to BDCs you already listed (Ares Capital, Main Street, Blue Owl, Golub, FS KKR, and peers — do not treat that list as complete; refresh from ADV/EDGAR).

3.3 Paid “do it for us”

If we pay for…	We should stop doing…
PitchBook export of companies where Investor = {GP} and Industry contains manufacturing, employees 50–500	Manual /portfolio scrape for that GP
Grata filter: PE-backed, NAICS manufacturing, employee band	Building the manufacturer list from GP sites at all
Capital IQ / Orbis corporate tree	Guessing parent from a DBA

We still scrape when PitchBook lags a deal announced this week, or the GP is an independent sponsor with no PitchBook profile.

4. Other capital (not PE, still a window)

Keep these on the same pass. They are not SG_021.

Source	Tool	Use
State UCC-1	Browser Run on SOS search	New press / all-assets lien. Pair SG_023.
SBA 7(a)/504 FOIA or local bank tombstone	Firecrawl	Building or machinery debt.
County/state incentives	Firecrawl / Exa	Job grants, TIF, new facility. SG_014.
BizBuySell / Axial teasers	Firecrawl	Exit / succession. Quality of earnings wants a real record.
Equipment captive (OEM finance)	Rarely public	Skip unless named in a release.

Distress (falling Paydex, lawsuit, missed covenant) is not a buying window we hunt. Love of client.

5. Agent runbook

Path A — we have PitchBook or Grata

1. Filter: US, manufacturing/industrials, employees 50–500 (or revenue that implies it), ownership = PE / financial sponsor.
2. Export CSV. Resolve domains. Dedup.
3. Optional: scrape each GP thesis page for hold-period language.
4. Write sg_021_hypothesis + source = pitchbook or grata.
5. Confirm on the call before using sponsor framing.

Path B — DIY (no seat)

1. Pull ADV private-fund advisers + SBIC directory + AIC/PEI seed. Dedup by CRD and domain.
2. For each GP domain, /map strategy + portfolio. Extract thesis. Skip if manufacturing_fit is no.
3. Extract current portcos. Rate-limit. Honor robots. No login.
4. Resolve domains (Research). Size via ZoomInfo.
5. ICP qualify (process, sites). Stop. No Salesforce bind from a logo.

{
  "gp_name": "",
  "gp_domain": "",
  "source_universe": "adv | sbic | pitchbook | grata | news",
  "thesis": {},
  "portco_name": "",
  "portco_domain": null,
  "ownership_kind": "sponsor | lender | unknown",
  "sg_021_hypothesis": false,
  "size_band_guess": null,
  "retrieved_at": "",
  "urls": []
}

Cap DIY at a batch of GPs (for example 25 theses/day), not the entire ADV file in one night.

If /portfolio is a challenge page: blocked. Do not rotate identity. Use Path A or a person.

What this is not

• Confirmation of SG_021. Detection still wants the sponsor naming the company, or a filing/release. A scraped logo is guessed.
• A threat story (“PE will force an ERP”). Hold period changes proof, not our right to pressure.
• License to scrape PitchBook, Preqin, or Grata behind a login we do not own.
• A list of hedge funds, crypto funds, or 13F long-only shops. 13F is public equity, not a plant portfolio.

Related knowledge

• ERP signal research — need / want / window
• Project bidding — PE bake-offs vs public portals; most BidNet "ERP" is not a portfolio company
• signals.yaml — SG_021, SG_006, SG_007, SG_018, SG_014
• signal-detection.yaml — SG_021 sources already include pr_wire, public_filings, manual_research
• Research — name → domain
• Sales stack

Change log

• 2026-08-31 — PE/GP universe (ADV, SBIC, AIC), thesis + portfolio scrape, BDC filings, PitchBook/Preqin/Grata vs DIY, other capital windows.