Technology due diligence: what impact does AI have on tech assets?

In 2025, private equity investment remained active in Europe, with $65 billion invested (+18%), despite a challenging market environment. At the same time, artificial intelligence has emerged as a key focus, now accounting for over 25% of global transactions.

This acceleration is creating new opportunities, but also risks that are more complex to identify, linked to the very nature of AI, which is revolutionising code development practices.

It is therefore more necessary than ever for investors to identify the risks associated with a technology acquisition, and technology due diligence is thus emerging as a key component of this risk analysis.

This article shares the key takeaways that an investor will gather from a technology due diligence process, including an analysis of AI-related risks.

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Key takeaways

Technology due diligence enables investors to anticipate risks that may impact valuation and post-acquisition costs.
Artificial intelligence introduces an additional level of uncertainty, linked to the rapid evolution of this technology and its applications.
Tech due diligence must now incorporate a specific technological assessment of AI, going beyond mere strategic perspectives.
A relevant AI analysis is based on two key areas: the maturity of applications and the risk of market disruption.
With AI constantly challenging the rules of the game, managing technological risk now requires ongoing monitoring.

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The role of tech due diligence for investors

Technology due diligence is now a must for any tech investor. It enables an assessment of the technology’s ability to support future growth, evolve effectively, withstand cybersecurity risks, and adapt to emerging technologies such as AI.

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Scalability and value creation

Scalability refers to a system’s ability to handle increasing workloads, users or integrations without compromising its performance.

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Assessment of hardware and software infrastructure

The audit examines how the system handles workload, database management and modularity, in order to assess the platform’s capacity to absorb higher transaction volumes, as well as its ability to integrate seamlessly with third-party tools.

This information enables, in particular, the quantification of technical debt.

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Assessment of Key People and Team Performance

Scalability is not limited to systems; it also applies to teams. An audit of the technical team’s composition, velocity and practices enables an assessment of its ability to adapt its output to the company’s growth objectives. This data can be derived from an analysis of the Git repository.

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Assessment of cyber resilience

In recent months, several high-profile data breaches have highlighted that a single vulnerability can cascade through partners, suppliers and customer systems, creating a systemic risk across entire ecosystems. Consequently, cybersecurity assessment is a cornerstone of any technology due diligence.

A comprehensive cybersecurity audit must include three levels of analysis:

An analysis of source code vulnerabilities, preferably carried out using a comprehensive source code scan.
Network footprint analysis,
Penetration testing

By cross-referencing the results of these three audits, investors will gain a comprehensive understanding of the company’s ability to withstand cyber threats, which cannot be fully assessed through interviews with management or questionnaires alone.

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Artificial intelligence: a new area of analysis

The adoption of AI is accelerating and delivering significant productivity gains, but it also introduces new risks that technological due diligence must identify.

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Assessing the maturity of AI usage

Initially, AI due diligence aims to assess the company’s maturity in the field of artificial intelligence. In this regard, three typical profiles can be distinguished:

‘Tactical Adopters’ use AI as a productivity tool without fundamentally transforming their organisation.
“Exploratory transformers” are rolling out numerous AI pilot projects but struggle to demonstrate how these initiatives generate EBITDA.
“Committed transformers” position AI as a structural pillar of their operational model, deployed across the entire organisation.

This analysis helps assess the company’s ability to turn AI into a performance driver, or to remain at a purely exploratory stage.

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Anticipating AI-related disruption

Secondly, the technology due diligence will assess the level of disruption that artificial intelligence may cause in the company’s market, and the company’s ability to cope with it.

The challenge is to identify whether the company is exposed to a risk of value loss or whether it is able to harness this disruption to turn it into a differentiating factor.

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Ensuring the asset’s long-term viability

Technological due diligence bridges the gap between technical KPIs and financial KPIs, providing a clearer understanding of the asset’s ability to generate value over the long term.

With AI revolutionising development practices and its applications multiplying, a one-off analysis at the time of acquisition is no longer sufficient to manage technological risk. Investors must adopt a long-term monitoring approach.

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About Vaultinum

Vaultinum supports private equity funds throughout the entire investment cycle: Tech Due Diligence at acquisition, ongoing monitoring through Continuous Diligence during the holding period, and Vendor Due Diligence at exit.

Through a combination of proprietary code scanning tools, data analysis and specialist experts, Vaultinum provides an independent view of technology assets and their evolution, as well as an analytical framework aligned with long-term strategic objectives.

Philippe Thomas, CEO of Vaultinum