Portfolio Chief Technology Officer

Overview:

A technology operating executive with past experience working as a CTO in the software industry, working across a portfolio of European mid-market B2B technology and SaaS businesses. You will partner with management teams and deal teams to shape and execute technology value-creation plans - from due diligence through hold period to exit. This is not a single-company CTO role: you operate as a trusted advisor across many companies at once, prioritising where senior technology leadership drives the most enterprise value.

Key responsibilities:

• Value creation. Define and drive technology value-creation agendas across portfolio companies - product architecture, scalability, technical debt, cloud and cost efficiency, security, data and AI enablement.
• Diligence & assessment. Support technical diligence on new investments; assess engineering organisations, tech stacks, and product readiness, and translate findings into actionable value creation plans.
• Partner network. Build, curate and manage a network of trusted third-party technology partners - implementation firms, specialist advisors, fractional leaders and vendors - to deliver execution at portfolio companies without carrying large internal headcount.
• Leadership & talent. Coach and mentor portfolio-company CTOs and engineering leaders; help assess, recruit and upgrade technology leadership where needed.
• Standards & sharing. Establish reusable playbooks, benchmarks and best practices; drive cross-portfolio knowledge sharing
• Exit readiness. Position technology assets for exit - articulating the equity story, de-risking the stack, and evidencing scalability to buyers.

Experience and Background:

• At least 15 years of senior technology leadership (CTO / VP Engineering / equivalent), ideally scaling B2B SaaS businesses in the mid-market.
• Track record delivering measurable value in a private-equity, portfolio or operating-partner context is preferred.
• Deep, current expertise across modern SaaS architecture, cloud, data platforms, applied AI, and AI within the SDLC process.
• Demonstrated ability to deliver through partners and lean teams - and comfort operating with a leveraged operating model.
• Comfortable operating across multiple companies, geographies and cultures within a European B2B context.

Competencies and Attributes

• Investor mindset - can translate technology into P&L, valuation and investor outcomes.
• Influence without authority; credible with founders, CEOs, deal teams and boards alike.
• A strong, active external network and the instinct to build and leverage relationships.
• Bias to action, comfort with ambiguity, and a collaborative fit within a team of functional experts.
• Aspires to breadth over depth, relishes novel problems.
• Comfortable operating through others, influencing decision makers, keeping executors honest.
• Investor mindset. Maturity to discern what matters to create value, and discipline to focus on it, ignoring the noise.
• Commercial. Articulates incisively impact achieved, can talk concisely to financial professionals.
• Ability to work in other European languages (beyond English) preferred.