In the news. Private-credit investors are facing a more challenging environment after several years of unusually strong performance. According to The Wall Street Journal, returns have moderated as interest rate cuts have reduced lending income, and loan defaults have normalized from historically low levels. Some funds have marked down loan values, trimmed dividends, or faced increased redemption pressure from wealthy investors. The sector continues to outperform many public-loan markets, but the period of easy gains appears to be fading. [WSJ]

Private credit is becoming less about deploying capital at pace and more about deploying it with precision.

On McKinsey.com. If private credit’s era of easy gains is ending, what comes next? Investors are taking a harder look at credit quality as the sector evolves. Concerns about leveraged credit losses, liquidity, and AI’s potential impact on software companies—which have been among private credit’s biggest borrowers—have led to increased scrutiny of underwriting and due diligence. Yet the outlook is far from bleak, write McKinsey’s Hyder Kazimi, John Spivey, and Warren Teichner in the latest chapter of McKinsey’s Global Private Markets Report 2026. Deal volumes were near historic highs in 2025, strategies beyond direct lending are expanding, and fundraising remains resilient.

See what’s next for private credit

In the news. AI is changing the balance of power in B2B sales as procurement teams increasingly use AI tools to compare vendors, analyze contracts, and benchmark pricing. As buyers can gather and compare information more easily, traditional vendor advantages are eroding, PYMNTS reports. Leading suppliers are responding by making their value easier to verify—through greater transparency, clearer performance metrics, and more structured product information. The result is a shift from persuasion-based selling to a model in which transparency and measurable outcomes increasingly determine competitive advantage. [PYMNTS]

On McKinsey.com. The B2B growth recipe has some new ingredients. Insights from McKinsey’s 2026 Global B2B Pulse Survey show that omnichannel engagement and an e-commerce presence are no longer differentiators but baseline expectations, according to McKinsey’s Candace Lun Plotkin, Enrique Gonzalez Campuzano, Greg Kelly, Jennifer Stanley, Steve Reis, Tjark Freundt, and Victor Garcia de la Torre. Leading performers are gaining a competitive advantage through integrating hyperpersonalization, AI, and sales-led account governance into commercial systems—capabilities that reinforce one another and compound growth over time. These leaders are four times more likely than peers to deliver one-to-one personalization and twice as likely to have fully adopted AI.

Build a stronger B2B growth engine

Coding in the agentic era

In the news. AI coding agents are beginning to handle complex software development tasks, Business Insider reports. Technology companies are increasingly deploying AI tools that can write code, test applications, identify bugs, and complete multistep engineering workflows with limited human intervention. As these capabilities improve, the role of software engineers is evolving from writing code to supervising, validating, and orchestrating AI-generated outputs. This shift could accelerate product development and reduce costs, but it also raises questions about what skills developers now need and how to ensure quality and rigorous governance. [Business Insider]

On McKinsey.com. Software companies that get maximum value out of AI agents don’t merely adopt cutting-edge tools—they rewire their software delivery models, operating practices, and governance to support human–AI collaboration for near-continuous software delivery. Early adopters are seeing three- to fivefold productivity improvements, McKinsey’s Jared Moon, Rory Walsh, Vito Di Leo, and Adam Thelwall report. In one pilot, software company Sonar redesigned its product development life cycle using an AI-native framework and achieved 50% to 80% productivity gains. Capitalizing on the agentic era involves rethinking developer workflows, modernizing engineering platforms, and establishing clear controls for quality, security, and accountability.

Speed up software delivery