Can a Growing Company Grow Faster While Spending Less Cash (Part 1) Source: Firas Raouf, Open View Partners A lot of growing businesses face a common issue as they advance past the early stages of their development: How can they accelerate growth while concurrently improving distribution efficiencies? In other words, how can they build a […]
6 Ways to Reduce Customer Acquisition Cost Read More »
By Margaret Heffernan, Entrepreneur and Author Although private companies have no legal obligation to create advisory boards, many of the most successful companies have them. Primarily this is because they’ve taken investment from individuals or firms for whom oversight and involvement is part of the price of the deal. But even firms owned wholly by their
Is Your Board of Directors Useful? Read More »
Source: Nick Petri – OpenView Partners In a great blog post entitled “Scaling is Hard,” Jeff Bussgang of Flybridge Capital gave four challenges that companies face after they’ve achieved the elusive product-market fit and started to gain traction with paying customers. As Jeff points out, scaling your company requires a very different skill set than
Scaling Your Business Model – 3 Necessary Adjustments Read More »
Source: Brendan Cournoyer While my posts typically cover topics like content marketing, SEO and social media, lately I’ve been reading a lot about another business topic that I felt inspired to sound off on. It involves giving employees the option to work from home. My colleague Devon McDonald recently touched on this topic in an
The Case FOR Letting Employees Work from Home Read More »
Source: Neil Patel Revenue is the most important metric when it comes to starting a business. But it’s not the only metric you should be concerned with. Of course some companies have gotten very creative when it comes to justifying their business model to investors, but I don’t think those are the kinds of metrics
9 Metrics Every Entrepreneurial Company Should Track Read More »
To survive and thrive in a competitive marketplace, companies need to secure help and guidance from a wide range of sources. To do so, many companies create advisory boards, or more formally, a board of directors to help guide them and hopefully facilitate growth. If your company plans to go public, it will be required
Board of Directors Versus Advisory Boards Read More »
In the wake of Solyndra’s revelation of an impending bankruptcy filing, the latest report from The Startup Genome Project makes for a timely read. The report, published last week, crunches data from a set of more than 3,200 companies, seeking to identify the qualities that make startups most likely to either succeed or fail. Researchers
#1 Predictor of Failure – Premature Scaling Read More »
Source: Tom Eisenmann – Professor, Harvard Business School The following post is republished with permission from the author’s blog, Platforms & Networks. This post is part of a series on business model analysis for entrepreneurs. The first post in the series presents a comprehensive list of issues (available as a downloadable PDF) entrepreneurs should consider
Viral Customer Acquisition – Business Model Analysis Read More »
Source: Brandon Hickie Acquiring new customers is hard work. Just ask any sales representative working at a startup or an expansion stage company. Trying to sell a new, unproven or unbranded product can be a struggle, especially in B2B markets where product acquisition costs are high and sales opportunities are few and far between. Oft
5 Unethical Sales Practices That Will Sink Your Brand Read More »
By Riaz Karamali and Camille Formosa One of the most common agreements entered into by an emerging company is the confidentiality agreement, also known as a non-disclosure agreement (“NDA”). You are likely to routinely be involved in discussions with third parties about possible collaboration or partnering, and in these situations it is customary (and
Coping with Confidentiality Agreements Read More »
Graf Research™ unleashes innovation by developing ideas into disruptive technologies. The Graf mission aims to perform research, provide services, apply analytics, and create products that enable secure, high-performance, embedded, and adaptive computing solutions.
When the Director of Finance for Graf was leaving the company, Graf needed an experienced financial team to get them through the transition. Managing Director Gary Hayes was introduced to Graf and determined that CFO Rendy Richards and Controller John Schefke would be an ideal combination. These two were particularly important because Graf is a U.S. Government contractor, and both Richards and Schefke have strong backgrounds and deep skill sets in this industry.
The two Scale Finance professionals quickly responded to Graf’s time-sensitive need, logically split up the work, learned the DELTEK version used by Graf, introduced more efficient processes and techniques, and helped meet their financial reporting needs. Our professionals also determined that the Senior Staff Accountant was underutilized and helped her grow into a permanent, cost-effective Controller role.
FX HedgePool (FXHP)
FX HedgePool (FXHP) is a New York and London-based highly innovative fintech company. FXHP is an award-winning peer-to-peer matching platform that optimizes the FX swaps market. The Company eliminates market impact and minimizes the effects of volatility – significantly improving outcomes for all investors.
FXHP’s unique credit model separates liquidity from credit, creating a new source of safe and dependable liquidity for the swaps market. The Company exists for the community, guided by the community with a “win-win-win” commitment that helps members, underlying investors, and banks yield safer and better results.
Scale Finance began serving FXHP years ago, providing annual business valuations to support 409A compliance for the Company’s management incentive equity plan. During this period, Scale Finance Managing Director Dave Gilroy advised FXHP about potential strategic corporate transactions. In 2022, the Company decided to raise institutional venture capital. Scale Finance managed this process from end to end, resulting in a highly successful closing of an $8 million Series A equity financing led by Information Venture Partners with participation from Fidelity International Strategic Ventures and NAventures (National Bank of Canada’s corporate venture capital arm).
Scale Finance continues to provide periodic business valuation support.
Heritage Trust
As the first independent trust company in New Mexico, established in 1994, Heritage Trust (HT) uses innovation, experience, and flexibility to meet clients’ needs. HT provides a full range of trust services, e.g., acting as their client fiduciary for their Trust assets, being an executor or personal representative related to the distribution of estate assets, managing and growing financial assets, and preparing annual tax returns for trusted clients.
Co-Founder and Managing Director of Scale Finance Gary Hayes has been providing CFO and managing Controller support since February 2021. We have streamlined their monthly and year-end close process and established budget/forecast capability to support management. Their business has grown over 40% since Scale Finance has been involved with the company’s financial management. Gary has also participated in Board Meetings as and when needed.
Southland Transportation Company
Southland Transportation provides transport, supply chain, and campus management services on a local, regional, and nationwide basis. When Southland contacted Scale Finance, they had a strong accounting staff but no Controller or CFO. After an unsuccessful search for a full-time CFO, Southland engaged CFO and Partner Rendy Richards as their fractional CFO.
Over 18 months, Richards helped integrate a new acquisition, made improvements in accounting and finance processes, developed the company’s first-ever annual budget, helped with the onboarding of a new Controller, and provided business valuations in conjunction with Scale Finance’s Managing Director, Dave Gilroy.
For over six decades, Cooper Electrical has served a wide range of industrial, commercial, and municipal customers across the Southeast, providing best-in-class Electrical Design/Build, BIM, Prefabrication, Instrumentation & Controls, and Calibration services. Cooper’s expertise spans multiple major markets, including bio-pharmaceutical, chemical, water & wastewater, power generation, manufacturing, gas production & transmission, and food & beverage.
When Cooper’s CFO left the company for another opportunity, the owners engaged Rendy Richards as interim CFO while they searched for a full-time replacement. On a half-time basis over eight months, Richards kept the company’s financial organization humming, made improvements in several business processes, initiated a detailed financial forecast, and met with the owners to share his observations and recommendations on the most feasible way to staff their finance and accounting department cost-effectively.
SymmetryRX, LLC
SymmetryRX is a leading provider of eSampling services allowing Pharma Manufacturing companies to access physician practices for the ordering and distribution of drug samples across the US. The Company was acquired in November 2018 from Aptus Health, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Merck. Since then, the company has expanded its robust suite of services that provides pharma manufacturing executives, brand managers, sales managers, product managers, and launch managers the ability to help more patients have greater access to samples, improving medication adherence and healthcare outcomes.
Co-Founder and Managing Director of Scale Finance Gary Hayes has been providing CFO Services to the Company since 2018 and was integral in the acquisition process, facilitated initial financing to support the company with a 7A SBA loan package of $600 thousand and an SBA-backed $300 thousand LOC. Since then, Gary has been actively providing CFO support across financial reporting, budgeting, forecasting, cash planning, and strategic planning.
