What are the investment opportunities for family offices in 2025?

Family offices have seen tremendous growth in recent years, with their numbers projected to increase by 33% to nearly 11,000 by 2030.

This has coincided with increasing professionalism of family offices and a shift toward more direct private equity investments.

To explore these trends and opportunities in 2025, we spoke with Fabian Brugger, Partner at Lucid Partners — a family equity investment firm and advisory based in Switzerland.

Q: What does Lucid Partners do and who are your clients?

Lucid Partners is a family equity investor, investing in direct PE with and for fellow family offices. The firm invests in leading companies in niche markets with sustainable and profitable business models, particularly in succession and growth situations. 

We provide patient family equity and transaction and portfolio related advisory services to small to mid-sized family offices, entrepreneurs and UHNWIs in the DACH region, the EU and overseas. 

We manage around $1bn in direct family equity assets and provide full end-to-end transaction and operational support for our investments.

Q: PwC data shows family office M&A rebounded in 2024 after a slow 2023. How do you see this trend evolving in 2025?

That lines up with our observations in the market. Lower interest rates and cheaper debt financing are helping drive deal activity, along with overdue exits by PE funds and succession needs at mid-sized businesses. We expect this momentum to continue through 2025. 

We’re also seeing families dedicating larger portions of their capital to direct private equity, drawn by the ability to diversify their overall wealth portfolio, the attractive long-term returns of the asset class, and the chance for more active value creation and being closer to the actual businesses, aligned with their entrepreneurial heritage and DNA.

Q: The number of club deals increased in 2024. Why is this model gaining traction, and what trends are you observing?

On average, families allocate 10-15% of their wealth to direct private equity, while target companies typically have an equity value starting at $15-20m. To maintain a diversified PE asset portfolio, co-investing is essential to keep ticket sizes manageable, depending on overall wealth.

At Lucid, most buy-side transactions are club deals. Pooling capital for better deal access, deeper due diligence and stronger governance influence allows families to make better investments, leveraging a deal-by-deal platform and participating in transactions that otherwise could not be executed due to lack of specialist personnel resources. 

Q: How do family offices balance long-term investment goals with the shorter-term financial returns typical of M&A?

Unlike private equity funds, family offices aren’t typically bound by fund lifecycles, so they can truly provide patient capital. This provides a competitive edge, when buying from entrepreneurs who might not want an exit-focused approach of a PE fund, and when timing their entries and exits more flexibly. 

Also, the club deal setup allows one family to exit to another family to accommodate individual holding period and liquidity needs.

Moreover, the ability to offer patient capital naturally aligns with many families’ genuine commitment to sustainability and impact investing, beyond superficial ESG criteria, to effectively align their portfolios with their legacy and philanthropic objectives while still achieving long-term value.

Q: What are the biggest challenges family offices face in the current M&A environment?

Macroeconomic and geopolitical uncertainty, inflation, and shifting interest rates remain key concerns. While deal volume is going up, valuation gaps persist, which calls for disciplined investment selection as well as operational expertise to drive post-deal value creation. 

We believe it is crucial to include a comfortable margin of safety in our investments and entry multiples, hence focus on proprietarily sourced deals that we execute in full exclusivity.

Family offices also face competition from PE firms and strategic buyers, pushing up valuations and complicating deal sourcing. This makes access to off-market and proprietary deals increasingly valuable. 

Additionally, many family offices have limited in-house M&A expertise, which complicates due diligence, slows execution speed, and makes post-acquisition value creation riskier, requiring external advisory support or building specialized internal teams.

Q: What opportunities exist for family offices to play a greater role in global M&A?

Family offices are in a good position to expand their direct investments, and current trends reinforce that shift.

Fragmented niches in industries such as industrial manufacturing, specialty retail, healthcare, and certain service sectors, offer attractive buy-and-build opportunities. A patient capital approach makes family offices ideal consolidators in these fields. They can also take advantage of mispriced assets during volatile markets, serving as stable capital providers in distressed or turnaround situations that might deter traditional investors.

We’re also noticing more interest in so-called “sunset” industries, which have predictable cash flows and entrenched market positions, helping hedge against volatility while facilitating long-term wealth creation.

Q: How does Lucid Partners create value for family offices in direct private equity?

We offer families direct access to proprietary, off-market deals that might otherwise be out of reach and provide end-to-end execution and support with a dedicated team of senior professionals – from due diligence to deal structuring and execution to ongoing asset management, portfolio work and eventually exits. We co-invest alongside our partners for full alignment of interests and have a hands-on, entrepreneurial approach. 

Our aim is to preserve capital and generate lasting wealth by tapping into attractive opportunities that we also genuinely enjoy building and growing.