Introduction
Across the private equity landscape, portfolio companies continue to invest in digital transformation, yet many still struggle to accelerate innovation. The challenge is rarely about intent but about the delivery model that drives execution. When product work is divided between in-house teams and managed services providers (MSPs), speed and continuity weaken, ownership of execution becomes unclear, and the promise of transformation is delayed.
Global Capability Centers (GCCs) offer a different path. These are client-governed entities that allow companies to build global capacity under their own leadership. Teams in these GCCs operate with the same direction, standards, and priorities as headquarters, which leads to greater control over how innovation is created, released, and scaled. EY projects that the global GCC market could approach $413 billion by 2030, which reflects the ongoing shift toward owned capability and long-term value creation.
Why GCCs Are Strategic for Portfolio Companies
A GCC is not to be looked at as simply an offshore delivery center. It is an operational extension of the enterprise, designed to combine cost efficiency with innovation velocity. By consolidating talent, technology, and governance within a single structure, GCCs help portfolio companies turn digital transformation from an initiative into a repeatable, scalable capability.
A GCC allows leadership to directly oversee execution and retain institutional knowledge, eliminating the friction and handoffs common in outsourced models. It ensures that decisions on technology, process, and talent remain aligned with long-term business priorities. As a result, GCCs become engines of innovation, capable of supporting complex functions such as engineering, analytics, and enterprise operations while ensuring continuity, compliance, and control across regions.
Why GCCs Are Built for Innovation
Innovation-intensive work depends on deep context, quick iteration, and close linkage to business goals. That is true for engineering, product development, data, and artificial intelligence. MSP models, while scalable, often dilute strategic context and introduce decision latency. Both effects slow innovation velocity.
A GCC places global teams within the company’s line of sight. Teams see the roadmap, align to enterprise priorities, and keep knowledge and intellectual property inside the business. The handoffs that cause delay reduces, release cadence strengthens, and quality improves while control remains with the company.
Operating Model and Governance
A high-performing GCC operates within a single governance spine that connects headquarters and the center.
- Objectives are shared and clearly owned across leadership
- Sprint and release routines are synchronized across locations
- Risk management practices remain consistent across sites
- Cross functional product and engineering pods work on the same platforms and pipelines to reduce friction and duplication
- Platform services and systems are standardized so teams can focus on outcomes rather than rework
- Performance is tracked through business results that matter, including time to release, cycle efficiency, reliability, and customer impact
- Security and compliance are built into daily work with access controls, data residency, and audit readiness designed into processes from the start
Standing Up Without Complexity
A GCC can start small and scale in measured steps.
- Mid-market portfolio companies begin with a focused scope such as product engineering, data, or finance
- Expansion follows a repeatable team template that adds capacity without disrupting delivery
- Location playbooks, talent pipelines, and compliant entity setups shorten time to value
- Full governance remains with the company from day one
- Budgets, hiring plans, and performance targets stay transparent and under internal control
- External partners act as accelerators while decision rights and accountability remain internal
Companies should proceed when leadership bandwidth, governance discipline, and budget certainty can be maintained, and should defer when these foundations are not yet in place.
Where GCCs Deliver the Greatest Impact
GCCs add the most value where speed, control, and continuity matter. That includes innovation-led domains and scale operations that demand governance and compliance.
- Product engineering and platform modernization
- Data, analytics, and AI and machine learning
- DevOps, reliability, and cybersecurity
- Finance and enterprise operations
- Customer and partner operations where data integrity and cycle time are critical
The decision to own or outsource should reflect strategic importance, pace of change, risk and compliance needs, and the value of retaining institutional knowledge.
Proof of Impact From a GCC
A global technology company backed by private equity moved core product work into a dedicated GCC and scaled through phased growth while mirroring headquarters governance, systems, and workflows.
- 50% of engineering headcount based in the GCC
- 50% of global product releases shipped from the GCC
- Knowledge and intellectual property retained inside the enterprise with fewer handoffs and a stronger release cadence
How Aeries Plays a Role
Aeries helps portfolio companies design, establish, and operate GCCs that deliver measurable innovation outcomes. We combine delivery governance, talent infrastructure, and technology integration to make global centers productive from day one.
Our approach covers the full lifecycle: strategy and design, entity setup, talent acquisition, and operational stabilization. For clients who prefer flexibility, Aeries can incubate the GCC under its own entity and transfer ownership when scale and governance are ready. For those ready to own from the start, we provide end-to-end execution support through established playbooks, partnerships, and compliance frameworks.
Across both models, our goal is consistent—helping organizations achieve faster delivery, better control, and sustainable innovation velocity.
A Platform for Long-Term Value Creation
GCCs do more than speed up delivery. They create a durable platform for innovation that compounds over time. Teams capture and reuse knowledge, processes stabilize and scale, and talent patterns become repeatable. This strengthens each portfolio company on its own, and it also gives private equity owners leverage across the portfolio through common frameworks and reusable expertise.
Aeries enables this transformation by helping clients move from intent to impact with speed and confidence, supported by disciplined governance, transparent execution, and a focus on continuous innovation.
