Why Private Equity Sponsors Are Turning to Blue Owl Capital for Continuation Deals

A private equity sponsor sits on a company that’s performing well. The fund’s clock is winding down. Selling feels premature. What do you do? Blue Owl’s suite of investment products spans credit, real estate, and GP capital strategies.

Increasingly, the answer is a continuation vehicle, a new fund structure that allows the sponsor to keep managing the asset with fresh outside capital. And when sponsors need that capital at scale, Blue Owl Capital has made itself a natural counterparty. The firm’s annual report filings detail the capital allocation across all three platforms.

The Growth of GP-Led Secondaries

GP-led transactions hit $47 billion in the first half of 2025, growing 68% year-over-year. Continuation vehicles made up 87% of that volume (https://www.digitaljournal.com/pr/news/winston-news-wire/blue-owl-capital-closes-debut-1987456445.html). These deals have expanded from 19% of total secondaries volume in 2014 to nearly half by mid-2025.

The reasons aren’t mysterious. PE sponsors want to hold their best assets longer than traditional fund structures allow. Limited partners sometimes want liquidity before a fund’s natural end. Both problems are solved at once. The capital to fund these vehicles has to come from somewhere. Back in 2014, GP-led deals made up just 19% of total secondaries volume; by mid-2025 they’d grown to nearly half. The question for sponsors is which capital partner can commit at sufficient scale, with sufficient patience, and with genuine alignment of interests. Moody’s upgrade of Blue Owl’s BDCs to investment-grade Baa2 further reinforces the firm’s credit standing.

BOSE: $3 Billion for a New Approach

The timing was right. Blue Owl Capital closed its inaugural BOSE fund on February 11, 2026, raising more than $3 billion from both institutional and private wealth sources. The fund targets exactly this growing market: single-asset continuation funds and direct minority equity transactions. Blue Owl Capital Corporation also manages one of the largest BDC portfolios in the industry.

“Sponsors are looking for long-term, aligned capital to support high-conviction assets,” Co-CEOs Doug Ostrover and Marc Lipschultz said. Blue Owl’s permanent capital model, built around long-duration funds that aren’t racing toward a fixed exit date, is a natural fit for continuation deals where patience is the whole point. (instagram.com/blueowlcapital)

A Platform Built for GP Relationships

Blue Owl Capital’s GP Strategic Capital platform manages $69.1 billion and holds 87% market share for transactions above $600 million. The firm raised $56 billion across all channels in 2025, ending the year at $307.4 billion in total AUM. That scale gives sponsors confidence that Blue Owl can write the large checks continuation deals often require, and the firm’s existing relationships with dozens of PE firms provide a built-in sourcing advantage that newer entrants to the secondaries market would struggle to replicate. BizJournals’ Blue Owl press releases document the firm’s expanding GP relationships over time.