Spotlight: Blue Owl Capital and Its GP Stakes Platform
Blue Owl holds minority equity in more than 70 private markets managers, a business that runs alongside the credit, net lease, and digital infrastructure vehicles it distributes through the wealth channel.
August 20, 2026
Blue Owl Capital (NYSE: OWL) is a New York alternative asset manager with $319 billion in assets under management as of June 30, 2026, invested across three platforms: Credit, Real Assets, and GP Strategic Capital. Through GP Strategic Capital, Blue Owl buys long-term minority equity in other private capital managers, so that platform’s economics come from those managers’ businesses rather than from deals Blue Owl sources itself.
The GP stakes business
GP Strategic Capital reports $71.5 billion in assets under management, more than 70 partnerships since inception, and more than 100 debt and equity transactions over a track record Blue Owl dates at more than 15 years. Blue Owl invests as a non-control holder. Partner managers named on its site include CVC, Silver Lake, Vista Equity Partners, HPS Investment Partners, Sixth Street, Golub Capital, Clearlake, and Starwood Capital Group. Two adjacent strategies sit alongside the equity stakes: senior secured loans to management companies, used to fund GP commitments and new strategy launches, and minority positions in NBA teams under a relationship with the league. Blue Owl’s HomeCourt Partners fund announced a minority investment in the Cleveland Cavaliers on July 6, 2026.
Partner managers also draw on a 60-person post-investment team based in New York, Menlo Park, London, and Hong Kong, which Blue Owl calls the GP Stakes Value Creation Group. Its stated remit covers corporate strategy and M&A, human capital, operations and IT, procurement, data science, AI adoption, and private wealth fundraising.
Three platforms, three predecessor firms
Oak Street, the predecessor to Real Assets, was founded in 2009 and launched its net lease strategy that year. Dyal Capital, the predecessor to GP Strategic Capital, followed in 2010. Owl Rock, the credit predecessor, was founded in 2016, and its first institutional direct lending fund raised $5.5 billion in equity commitments. Owl Rock and Dyal agreed to merge in 2020, the combined firm began trading on the NYSE in 2021, and Oak Street joined in 2022. Acquisitions since include Wellfleet Credit Partners in 2022, Cowen Healthcare Investments in 2023, Prima Capital Advisors, Kuvare Asset Management, and Atalaya Capital Management’s business in 2024, and IPI Partners’ business in 2025.
What reaches advisors
Blue Owl’s Private Wealth team, which the firm puts at more than 190 professionals globally, covers five lines. Direct lending runs through non-traded BDCs and insurance dedicated funds, with a separate technology lending strategy for established and high-growth software companies. OWLCX is a ticker-traded interval fund in alternative credit, aimed at asset-based finance rather than traditional direct lending. Net lease is a private REIT holding single-tenant commercial properties on long-term leases. Digital infrastructure is an evergreen structure holding data centers, fiber networks, and towers. GP minority stakes is the fifth.
Two of those rest on tenant and borrower credit, and Blue Owl publishes its definitions: investment grade means a rating of BBB- or higher from S&P or an equivalent from another nationally recognized statistical rating organization, while creditworthy means Blue Owl itself judges the business sound enough to justify the lease or the credit. SQX Alts tracks the monthly disclosures from several of these vehicles, including Blue Owl Net Lease Trust and Blue Owl Digital Infrastructure Trust.
Recent developments
On August 4, 2026, Blue Owl announced the final close of its first European net lease fund, Blue Owl Real Estate European Net Lease Fund, with €1.6 billion in total capital commitments, above an original €1.0 billion target and a €1.5 billion hard cap. The fund buys single-tenant net leased real estate and infrastructure let to investment-grade tenants in the UK and continental Europe. Marc Zahr, co-president and global head of real assets, described the strategy as applying the U.S. sale-leaseback approach to a European market Blue Owl estimates at €13.4 trillion. According to the firm, the Real Assets platform had raised $8.48 billion of capital in 2026 as of June 30.
