Bregal Milestone has taken a majority stake in Beyond Now, betting on cloud-native B2B platforms as telecom operators race to monetise 5G, cloud and AI services for business customers.
The undisclosed majority growth investment, recently announced, gives the pan-European growth investor control of the Irish-headquartered software provider and signals renewed private equity appetite for specialised telco SaaS in the European mid-market.
A targeted bet on telco B2B monetisation
Beyond Now develops the Infonova Digital Business Platform, a cloud-native, microservices-based SaaS stack built on Kubernetes, PostgreSQL, Elasticsearch and Redis. The platform enables communications service providers (CSPs) to design, package and sell B2B services – including 5G, cloud and AI offerings – often in partnership with third‑party technology vendors.
The company is not a generalist enterprise software play. It is tightly focused on telecommunications, with a customer list that includes Verizon, NTT, Deutsche Telekom, TELUS, BT, Telia, Lyse and A1. That roster demonstrates both Tier‑1 traction and the sector’s willingness to outsource critical monetisation and marketplace functionality to specialised cloud-native platforms.
For Bregal Milestone, the deal locks in exposure to a segment of telco IT spending that is growing faster than traditional network capex: B2B service orchestration, partner marketplaces and digital commerce for enterprise clients. As CSPs seek to move beyond connectivity into higher‑margin solutions, platforms like Infonova sit directly in the value‑creation layer.
With the trend: PE doubles down on vertical SaaS
The transaction is firmly with trend on two fronts:
- Vertical SaaS for regulated industries – Investors have been rotating into vertical, mission‑critical software with long contracts and high switching costs. Telco BSS/OSS modernisation and enterprise monetisation platforms fit that profile.
- Cloud-native, partner-centric architectures – Beyond Now’s microservices and Kubernetes-based architecture aligns with CSPs’ shift away from monolithic legacy stacks toward composable, API‑driven platforms that can support ecosystems of partners.
Beyond Now’s emphasis on mid-market enterprises and European customers positions it squarely in MidMarketNow’s core range: it enables CSPs to package and deliver sophisticated digital services to medium-sized corporates that lack the scale to build bespoke solutions, but increasingly demand 5G, edge and AI capabilities.
Dublin centre underpins European growth thesis
As part of its expansion, Beyond Now has opened a technology centre in Dublin, strengthening its engineering base and proximity to European customers. The move underlines two important elements of the growth story:
- Talent access – Dublin remains a key hub for cloud and software engineering in Europe, giving Beyond Now a stronger pipeline of technical talent to scale its cloud-native stack.
- Customer proximity – With a stated focus on the European market and mid-market enterprises, a Dublin centre improves support and delivery for regional CSPs and their B2B clients.
For Bregal Milestone, this provides a tangible operational lever: accelerate product development and customer onboarding from a scalable European base, rather than relying solely on distributed or legacy locations.
Mid-market implications: enabling CSPs to serve SMEs at scale
The strategic relevance for the mid-market is direct. CSPs increasingly see SMEs and upper mid-market corporates as the next growth frontier for advanced connectivity, cloud and AI solutions. But serving this segment profitably demands:
- Rapid productisation of new services
- Automated onboarding and billing
- Easy integration of third‑party software and infrastructure
Beyond Now’s marketplace and digital business capabilities are designed to industrialise exactly these workflows. This allows telecom operators to launch and manage complex B2B offerings for thousands of mid-sized customers without bespoke integration each time.
In effect, the platform becomes an enabler of mid-market digital transformation, delivered via telco channels rather than direct vendor sales. That aligns with both CSPs’ search for new revenue streams and mid-sized enterprises’ preference for trusted, integrated providers.
Risks: telco cycles and platform competition
The investment is not risk‑free. Key challenges include:
- Telco budget pressure – CSPs are under margin and capex pressure, which can delay or fragment IT modernisation projects. This risk is partly mitigated by the shift of spend from pure network build‑out to monetisation and enterprise services, where Beyond Now is positioned.
- Competitive landscape – The market for BSS/OSS and digital marketplaces includes large incumbents and newer cloud-native challengers. Beyond Now’s differentiation rests on its microservices architecture, proven Tier‑1 deployments and focus on B2B ecosystems rather than generic billing.
Nonetheless, Bregal Milestone’s decision to take a majority growth stake – rather than a minority position – indicates conviction that scale, product depth and a sharpened go‑to‑market can offset these risks.
A clear signal for European mid-market tech
This deal reinforces a clear message for the European mid-market: sector‑specialist, cloud-native platforms that unlock new revenue models for incumbents remain highly investable. Beyond Now sits at the intersection of telco, cloud and AI‑enabled services for business customers – exactly where private equity sees durable growth.
While the valuation is undisclosed, the structure and timing of the transaction place Beyond Now firmly in the cohort of mid-market European software companies attracting institutional majority capital to accelerate the next phase of expansion.