Market analysis.
Market structure, size and growth by segment. Demand drivers, cycles and the assumptions behind the investment thesis.
Your deal accelerator.
Built for investors.
AI augmented by humans.
For private equity teams and family offices, from due diligence to growth strategy. AI does the heavy lifting in research, analysis and calculations. Our senior team challenges the findings and turns them into recommendations your investment team can act on.
The investment perspective
Test the case.
Find the growth.
From target screening and early due diligence to growth strategy and focused analysis. Commission a full investment assessment or go deeper on a specific question, from customer quality to an acquisition plan.
Competition.
Competitive positions, barriers to entry and customer buying criteria. Where the target can win, and what could change that.
Growth strategy.
New markets, products and customer segments. Priorities for organic growth and acquisitions, with the conditions each opportunity needs to succeed.
Customer-base analysis.
Concentration, retention, spending patterns and payment behaviour. What the customer base tells you about revenue quality and future growth.
Financial analysis.
Growth, margins and cash generation tested against peers and downside scenarios. How they affect value and when expected returns fall below your target.
Past deals and exit routes.
Comparable transactions, consolidation patterns and potential buyers. What precedents tell us, and where the comparison reaches its limits.
What you get
A recommendation.
The evidence behind it.
An AI tool can help you explore a question. HLBRT is accountable for the analysis: a clear recommendation, the analysis behind it and a senior team to discuss what it means for your investment.
Ready for your deal team.
A clear investment view in PowerPoint, with supporting analysis in Excel. The questions, structure and conclusions draw on years of experience in top-tier strategy consulting.
Specialists built for diligence.
Agents screen acquisition targets, break markets into meaningful segments and investigate companies in depth. Our operating system coordinates their work around the questions an investment team needs answered.
Data you can work with.
Alongside the recommendation, you receive the underlying data, sources, assumptions and calculations. Your team can trace the evidence, test alternatives and carry the analysis into the next phase of the deal.
Human where it matters.
AI handles the bulk of research, analysis and calculation. Senior experts frame the question, challenge the conclusions and work directly with your team on their implications and the decisions ahead.
Selected engagements
Beyond the brief.
Closer to the decision.
Two early due diligence engagements. Each went beyond the initial questions to test the assumptions behind the investment case, from revenue visibility to the quality of growth.
01 · Industrial equipment & services
Does market demand
translate into revenue?
The brief: assess market growth, competition and revenue visibility for an industrial supplier with project-based sales.
What we added
From sector growth to contract awards.
Mapped the construction pipeline against production capacity and delivery schedules. Distinguished total investment in new projects from the outsourced work a supplier could actually win.
From order book to revenue visibility.
Distinguished signed work from expected awards, examined delivery delays and customer risk, and tested whether recurring refurbishment demand meant recurring revenue for the same supplier.
From reported margins to comparable economics.
Reconciled differences in accounting and acquisition scope before comparing peers. Examined how customer advances and payment timing affected cash generation alongside reported earnings.
What this clarified
Which growth assumptions depended on market demand, contract wins or delivery timing, and what the next stage of diligence needed to verify.
02 · Testing & inspection services
What supports growth
beyond the headline?
The brief: assess market growth, margins and an acquisition-led plan for a testing, inspection and certification platform.
What we added
From one market to distinct growth drivers.
Broke the market down by customer industry and service line, separating price from volume. Tested growth in the existing business against the contribution expected from future acquisitions.
From customer count to revenue quality.
Examined concentration, spending bands, customer losses and overdue payments. Compared customer records with reported revenue and public contracts to identify gaps for further investigation.
From adjusted earnings to investment returns.
Reconciled reported and adjusted earnings, tested cash conversion and acquisition assumptions, and linked purchase price, debt and exit scenarios to the returns expected by the investor.
What this clarified
Which assumptions depended on market growth, customer quality or acquisitions, and what the next stage of diligence needed to verify.
The founders
Senior judgment.
Built into HLBRT.
Strategy at board level, and AI in production since 2018. Both shape our work.
Frédéric Boutet
Co-founder · President
Former Managing Director & Partner at BCG X, Frédéric led major AI transformations across Europe and Africa, and numerous strategic engagements for financial institutions, insurance, private equity and retail. His nearly 25 years in the sector span consulting and banking leadership at LCL.
Jean-Philippe Poisson
Co-founder · Managing Director
Jean-Philippe is on his third company, his second in AI. He co-founded YZR, focused on language-model reliability, with clients in 14 countries and $14M raised. He also co-founded Elia, a digital innovation consultancy, was a Partner at Julhiet Sterwen and is on the board of Hub France IA.
Our approach
A first view in days.
A dialogue throughout.
Your deal team works directly with our senior team. We agree the scope and timing, share an initial view, then deepen the analysis around the questions that matter most to your decision.
01 · Frame
Brief our senior team.
Share the investment question, the available material and your deadline. Together, we define the scope, the assumptions to test and the deliverables your team needs.
02 · Discuss
Review a first view.
Within days, review an initial output with our senior team. Discuss the findings, challenge the assumptions and agree which questions deserve deeper investigation.
03 · Deepen
Take the analysis further.
We investigate the agreed priorities and deliver a final recommendation with its supporting data and evidence. We discuss the implications and the questions that remain open.
Questions welcome throughout. Bring new questions, documents or feedback at any point. We incorporate them as the work develops, and our senior team remains available throughout the engagement.
Confidentiality
What you share
stays yours.
Sensitive investment work needs clear boundaries. Client material, access and external research follow the confidentiality requirements agreed for each engagement.
A dedicated client workspace.
Your questions, documents and analysis sit within your client workspace. Access is controlled for the engagement.
Clear rules for your data.
Each engagement sets out what data is needed, who can access it, how long it is kept and how client rights are handled.
Evidence you can check.
Sources, assumptions and calculations accompany the analysis, so you can inspect its basis and challenge its conclusions.
Names replaced before searches.
When research needs public sources, names and identifiers are replaced before a search leaves our protected environment, and restored only inside it.
No model training on your data.
Your material is used for your questions and your account only. It is never used to train a model or support another client’s work.
Your documents stay yours.
What you share informs your own work. It is never pooled, reused or made visible to another client.
Start a conversation
Your next investment.
A clearer perspective.
A few lines on the investment question ahead of you. Please keep confidential details out of this first message.