As founder and CEO of Dedale, Ben leads global growth and high-impact intelligence delivery for investors and corporates. With over 13 years of experience in strategic due diligence and innovation, including roles at BCG and Astorg Partners, he brings deep expertise in software verticals like industrial tech, supply chain, cybersecurity, and CFO tools.
In this candid conversation, Ben shares how Dedale is scaling at the intersection of technology, talent, and transformation. He discusses the paradigm shift AI is bringing to research and decision-making, the acceleration of software innovation, and the firm’s commitment to staying ahead through proprietary tools and deep tech-native intelligence. From embedding AI into every layer of their operations to leading with agility and conviction, Ben offers a forward-looking view on how leaders and investors can navigate – and shape – the future of B2B software.
How do you define great leadership, and how has that evolved throughout your career?
That’s a lifelong question, one I continue to learn from every day. I wouldn’t pretend to have reached absolute wisdom, but a few principles have guided me throughout my journey.
First and foremost: lead by example. I strongly believe leadership should be demonstrated daily. It demands relentless energy, drive, and humility. By embodying what I expect from others, I hope to inspire and empower those around me to lead in turn. But leadership is never about standing alone, it’s about nurturing other leaders and creating the conditions for collective success.
Another guiding principle at Dedale is a mantra we hold dear: “Eyes in the stars, boots on the ground.” It reflects our dual focus: being ambitious, bold, and visionary while staying grounded, pragmatic, and relentlessly action-oriented. It’s a constant balance between driving long-term transformation and delivering tangible impact every single day.
What changes do you anticipate in your industry over the next two years, and are you excited about them?
Absolutely, there’s never been a more dynamic time.
In the B2B software and technology space, we’re seeing continued acceleration post-COVID. Companies are rebuilding growth models, leading to a shakeout of winners and losers. The cloud transition remains an enduring trend, especially in vertical SaaS, where many vendors still have room to complete their shift.
Next, we’re witnessing the early but powerful wave of AI-driven transformation. At Dedale, we’re integrating AI into every research topic we touch. While many answers are still evolving, some clear use cases and winning models are already emerging.
On the investment side, deal volume has been subdued after the peak years of 2020–2022, largely due to valuation mismatches and macro headwinds. But the appetite remains strong, with dry powder at record levels and growing pressure to exit long-held positions. We expect deal flow to rebound.
A particularly exciting trend we’re contributing to is the rise of specialized investing. Dedale helps investors move faster and with more conviction by providing deep, tech-native intelligence. It’s a role we’re proud to play and one that’s gaining momentum in the broader market.
What are your three key priorities over the next 12 months?
We have many, but three stand out:
– Scalability – Demand from sponsors, corporates, and advisors continues to surge. Our challenge now is to maintain our standards of excellence while scaling operations across all fronts.
– North American expansion – We’ve been cross-Atlantic from the start, but we’re doubling down on North America. More firms are trusting us, and we’re building deeper reach and capacity to serve them with tailored insights and local support.
– Technology and talent investment – We’re expecting high double-digit growth in headcount, and we’re just as committed to scaling our proprietary technology stack. We’re embedding AI in everything we do to ensure our intelligence offering remains best-in-class.
As a leader, what skills do you continuously work on to stay at the top of your game?
AI is a top priority, we aim to be best-in-class in how we scout, adopt, and integrate AI into our workflows. We’ve already embedded several tools across our operations but we treat this as Day One: the learning never stops.
Beyond that, we’re always pushing ourselves to challenge and refine our research methodology. We strive to set a new benchmark for tech market intelligence, constantly improving how we collect, quantify, and synthesize insights.
How do you adapt your leadership style in times of uncertainty or crisis?
At Dedale, two words define our DNA: agility and speed.
This means taking bold decisions fast, learning even faster, and adjusting course quickly based on results. I believe deeply in risk-taking and experimentation, and I encourage our team to embrace mistakes, not as failures, but as fuel for growth.
Our aim is to build a decentralized organization where this mindset is embedded across every level. That’s how we remain resilient, even in turbulence.
How do you ensure your vision and strategy remain aligned with your people and customers?
We believe in being a frontline organization. Every single person at Dedale engages with our customers, not just the customer success team. This ensures real-time feedback loops and a strong sense of shared purpose across the business.
Our customers are not just clients; we see them as thought partners. That mindset shapes our collaboration model and keeps our strategy rooted in what truly matters to those we serve.
How do you foster a culture of continuous learning within your team?
Interestingly, when we asked why people joined Dedale, learning came out as the number one reason.
We’re proud to offer an environment where team members can grow, evolve, and stretch themselves every day. We invest heavily in internal learning, mentorship, and exposure to high-impact projects and we see that paying off in both individual fulfillment and company performance.
What strategic role do you see AI playing in your business over the next three to five years, and how are you preparing your teams for it?
We’re fully aware, and realistic, that AI is set to radically transform our industry over the next three to five years. Information research, in particular, will undergo a complete paradigm shift. We’ve already begun integrating tools that significantly accelerate our research cycle and amplify our leverage over data.
That said, we strongly believe human intelligence and judgment will remain as critical as ever. The real shift is in how these human capabilities are being augmented or supercharged by AI. Equipping our teams with these capabilities is a daily priority.
Another major transformation is how fast technology vendors can now evolve and develop. The acceleration in software development is unprecedented, and it’s only the beginning. Our focus is to stay ahead of the curve, analyzing these shifts and identifying tangible, commercial-grade use cases.
Rather than feeding the hype, our goal is to provide grounded, granular insights that help investors, corporates, and advisors understand what’s really happening in AI and tech markets.
In your experience, where does AI add the most value and where are its limitations most clear?
As mentioned, AI excels at handling repetitive tasks and extracting insight from massive volumes of data, making it a game-changer for knowledge-based businesses like ours. It boosts efficiency and scale in ways that were previously unthinkable.
However, its limits are equally clear: judgment, strategic thinking, and complex decision-making still rest firmly in human hands.
The future lies in this hybrid intelligence, humans powered by AI. That combination holds the greatest potential for stronger, faster, and more insightful decision-making.
How do you integrate diversity and inclusion strategies into your leadership approach, and how do you believe this impacts your organization’s culture and performance?
Diversity and inclusion are foundational to how we operate. Given the truly global nature of our ecosystem, our clients, partners, and the markets we analyze, it was obvious from day one that we needed to build a global team from the ground up.
We now have offices in France, the Philippines, Vietnam, Egypt, and are currently building a U.S. presence. For example, our Paris office of 50+ people includes over 18 nationalities, a source of pride and a deliberate outcome of our recruiting strategy.
We also actively seek diverse professional backgrounds, offer early-career opportunities, and emphasize gender parity across all departments.
We’re proud of how far we’ve come, but we remain humble and committed to doing more. Diversity isn’t just an HR initiative; it’s a strategic priority and something we aim to lead by example on.