An investment ticket is the unit amount invested by a fund or investor in a company during a private equity transaction — whether an LBO, a venture capital raise, growth equity or a co-subscription. It directly determines the profile of the target sought and the investor's positioning within the private equity ecosystem.

Investment tickets vary considerably by investor type: business angels typically invest CHF 50,000 to 500,000; seed VC funds CHF 500,000 to 3 million; Series A funds CHF 3 to 15 million; growth equity funds CHF 3 to 20 million; and mid-market LBO funds CHF 10 to 80 million in equity per transaction. These thresholds define the intervention zones of each investor category.

For a private equity fund, the minimum ticket is generally 10% of the total fund size — ensuring sufficient concentration to justify the investment and monitoring time. A CHF 100 million fund will not go below CHF 8–10 million per ticket regardless of target quality.

Example: Hectelion identifies for an owner seeking to raise CHF 4.5 million in growth equity that the profile matches the tickets of 3 Franco-Swiss regional SME funds (CHF 2–8 million tickets) but is below the minimum threshold of 4 mid-market funds (tickets > CHF 10 million). Investor targeting is thus precisely calibrated to the sought ticket size.

At Hectelion, we help executives and entrepreneurs identify investors whose investment ticket matches their financing needs in our fundraising advisory mandates.