Venture and Growth Deals in 2026: Small Tickets, Specialist Firms

A firm that wants a share of startup and growth financing needs two facts before it hires: how large the deals are, and who already does them. Sartori & Partners data show 1,808 dated venture and growth deals in the 12 months to October 2026, with a value published on 66.5% of them and a median of $55.1 million where one is published. That is a different business from M&A, where the median disclosed deal is $1,200 million. The list of venture capital law firms is different too. Firms built around emerging companies sit at the top, and five of the M&A top 10 do not appear on it at all.

Where a price is published, the median venture or growth deal in the Sartori & Partners records is $55.1 million. The median M&A deal is $1,200 million, 21.8 times the venture figure, and the median private equity deal is $2,050 million, 37.2 times it. Among the transactional deal types, the next lowest median belongs to real estate, at $274.1 million, still several times the venture median.

The base under each median matters as much as the median. A value is disclosed on 66.5% of venture deals, against 10.3% of M&A deals and 11.3% of private equity deals. Venture rounds publish a figure 6.5 times as often as M&A deals do. Each median rests on the disclosed deals only: the venture figure describes most of the market, while the M&A and private equity figures describe only the minority of deals that announce a price.

For a firm planning a venture practice, the ticket is the first constraint. A round of this size carries a fee that cannot carry M&A staffing, so the work pays on volume, on repeat founders and funds, and on lean teams with more associate hours per partner. A partner with a venture book brings many small mandates rather than a few large ones, and the bench has to be priced and staffed for that from the start.

Technology and software companies appear in 27.7% of venture and growth deals, against 6.8% of all dated deals, or 4.1 times their share of the whole record. Financial sponsors appear in 15.0% of venture deals and 6.9% of all deals, a gap of 8.1 points.

Fintech and payments shows the same pull at a smaller size, at 4.5% of venture deals against 1.0% of all deals, and aerospace and defense companies appear in 4.1% of rounds against 1.3% overall. Pharma and biotech sits closer to its place in the wider market, at 10.8% against 6.8%. These are shares of deals involving each industry, so they are compared side by side, not summed.

The client mix sets the partner profile. A venture hire needs standing with technology founders and with the funds that back them, because funds sit on the investor side of many rounds. A corporate partner whose clients are mostly banks, property owners or industrial groups will find that the book does not convert into venture mandates, however strong it is.

Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati ranks first by venture and growth deals advised, in the 251-400 band, while it ranks 6th in M&A. Fenwick & West and Gunderson Dettmer Stough Villeneuve Franklin & Hachigian, third and fourth in the 101-150 band, do not appear in the M&A top 10, and neither do Cooley, Osborne Clarke or Foley & Lardner.

Five firms sit on both lists: Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, Latham & Watkins, Goodwin Procter, DLA Piper and Jones Day. The first M&A adviser, Latham & Watkins, ranks 2nd in venture. Kirkland & Ellis, second in M&A, is not on the venture list. The private equity list is further away still: of its ten firms, only Latham & Watkins also appears among the venture advisers.

The bands tell the same story from another side. The first venture adviser sits at 251-400 deals advised, the first M&A adviser at 401-700. Venture work does not concentrate in the largest corporate practices; it concentrates in the firms that chose emerging companies as their core client.

M&A strength does not carry over on its own. The firms that do most rounds hold the founder and fund relationships that bring rounds in, and those relationships sit with named partners. For a firm entering venture work, a partner from one of the specialist practices is the short route; a strong M&A partner without venture clients is a long one.

In the Sartori & Partners deal records, Corporate & M&A lawyers appear on 63.1% of venture and growth deals, against 90.2% of M&A deals. Private equity lawyers appear on 7.4% of rounds, intellectual property lawyers on 2.1% and capital markets lawyers on 1.2%. A deal can carry lawyers from several practices, so these shares overlap.

The client base is wide and turns over. Venture deals came from 1,312 distinct clients in 12 months, which is 1.4 deals for each client, against 1.8 in M&A. Many venture clients appear once in a year and then not again until their next round.

A venture group therefore runs on a corporate core with private equity and technology knowledge around it, and on constant business development. A firm that staffs it as a side activity of the M&A group has to win each founder again at the next round.

Dated venture and growth deals rose 12.5% on settled 12-month windows, from 1,614 to 1,815. Over the same windows M&A rose 8.9%, from 8,475 to 9,226, and private equity rose 10.8%, from 1,604 to 1,778. All dated deals rose 10.6%, from 43,590 to 48,216.

On the hiring side, lateral partner hiring in Corporate & M&A rose 12.2%, from 778 partners in the earlier settled year to 873 in the latest. The two series count different things, deals on record and partner moves, so a similar rate is a sign of a busy corporate market, not proof that one drives the other.

Rising venture volume and rising corporate partner moves together mean firms hiring for venture compete with M&A practices for the same corporate partners. The venture specialist is the scarcer of the two profiles, and the firms that hold most of them are already busy, so offers have to be made early.

Price the practice for volume. Sartori & Partners figures put the median round at $55.1 million on the 66.5% of deals that disclose a value, so the business case rests on deal count, rates and associate leverage, not on large single fees. Hire for the client mix: technology companies appear in 27.7% of rounds and financial sponsors in 15.0%, so a candidate's founder and fund relationships matter more than deal size on a CV. Recruit where the work is done: the specialist practices on the venture list, more than the M&A leaders, hold the partners with those relationships.