Bravo is co-founder and managing partner at Thoma Bravo, a private equity firm with $181 billion in assets under management as of September 2025. The Chicago, Illinois-based firm is known for its investments in enterprise software companies, including SolarWinds, Dynatrace and McAfee.
The majority of Bravo's fortune is derived from his stake in Thoma Bravo, a private equity firm that had $181 billion in assets as of Sept. 30, 2025, according to its website.
Bravo's stake in the firm has been determined based on discussions in February 2025 with a person familiar with Bravo's ownership who did not wish to be identified because the information is private. Its valued based on the average price-to-assets under management ratio of publicly-traded peers Ares Management Corp., KKR & Co Inc., Apollo Global Management Inc. and Blackstone Inc.
About $7.1 billion of the firm's assets belonged to related persons, according to an analysis of the firm's March 2025 ADV filing, and Bravo's personal stake was worth about $3.8 billion in September 2024, according to the person.
Outside of Thoma Bravo, the billionaire has about $2.4 billion in cash, securities, property and other assets, according to the person familiar.
Bravo grew-up in Mayaguez, Puerto Rico. His father was a shipping agent.
When he was a teenager Bravo moved to Florida to pursue a tennis career at the Nick Bollettieri Tennis Academy, training with future stars including Jim Courier and Andre Agassi.
He did his undergraduate studies at Brown University after receiving a tennis scholarship. He then worked as an investment banker at Morgan Stanley before studying law and business at Stanford University. After graduating he joined generalist private equity firm Thoma Cressey.
Bravo began investing in technology companies. After losing money on startup investments he pivoted to buying more established software businesses. In 2008, he and Carl Thoma founded Thoma Bravo together to focus on the sector.