Investors and Funding

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Business Plan Consultants: Who They Are and How They Create Value

Due in part to the unceremonial nature of its title, the value-creation potential of business plan consultants is often misunderstood and underappreciated. Questions such as, “What do they do that I can’t?”, “Why do they cost so much?” and, “Don’t you think we can handle this ourselves?”, all too often haunt their practice.

Having prolifically added value to 25+ clients across a range of industries, sizes, and mandates, Toptal Finance Expert, Josh Chapman, sheds light on the full scope of business plan consulting. What it is to be a great business plan consultant, how they create value, and what skills, attributes and experiences constitute the greats vs. the pretenders.

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Josh Chapman

Josh Chapman

After covering tech IPOs on Wall Street, Josh brought this experience to the other side of the table and founded two companies of his own.

Working Capital Optimization: Practical Tips From a Pro

A decidedly less sexy, albeit critical, part of a CFO’s job description is working capital management and optimization. There are countless examples of companies that are forced to incur unnecessary debt and other financial obligations to meet their short-term financing needs, when in fact ample cash is sitting idly stuck in working capital.

But working capital optimization is hard to get right and often requires significant cross-functional efforts to execute effectively. In this article, Toptal Finance Expert Emilio Labrador draws on 25 years of professional experience across multiple industries to outline some of his main suggestions and approaches on how to tackle working capital management projects.

13 minute readContinue Reading
Emilio Labrador

Emilio Labrador

Emilio has 25 years of CFO experience in Europe and LatAm. An expert in M&A, he has executed two $300m+ acquisitions and a $400m+ disposal.

Caution to the Wind: Views on the Renewable Energy Growth Boom

Renewable energy generation, lead by solar PV and wind power, is growing at a considerable rate. Innovations are lowering the cost to generate such power to levels of traditional fossil fuels. Yet underneath the positive headlines, there are some fundamental issues that remain in the long-term sustainability of business models in the industry.

13 minute readContinue Reading
Dhruv Tandan

Dhruv Tandan

Dhruv has worked on M&A and fundraises for energy, infrastructure, RE, and agricultural projects across India, the ME, and Africa.

Effective Startup Boards: What They Are and How to Build Them

Depending on your perspective, type, and motivation, the idea of building a board of directors either excites or intimidates you, complete with all associated imagery of aged oak rooms, brief-case wielding titans, and expensive cigars.

This article, by Toptal Finance Expert Orinola Gbadebo-Smith, sets out to debunk a few myths. It sheds light on boards as a construct, their workings, dealings, and nuances, and explores some battle-tested strategies for recruiting, building, and managing effective boards.

16 minute readContinue Reading
Orinola Gbadebo-Smith

Orinola Gbadebo-Smith

Ori is an investor turned entrepreneur with experience across M&A, PE, VC and startup operations. He most recently founded a VC-backed startup.

Fundraising Consultants vs. Broker-dealers

Fundraising is hard to get right, which is why companies of all sorts often turn to fundraising experts for help and advice regarding the fundraising process. There is a multitude of different professional figures that help companies raise capital, but for startups and growth companies, the two figures most often encountered are fundraising consultants and broker-dealers. Who is right for which endeavor?

19 minute readContinue Reading
Aleksey N. Krylov, CFA

Aleksey N. Krylov, CFA

Aleksey has contributed to 25+ private equity deals and has advised 50+ clients on raising equity in a range of different sectors.

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Justifying Investments With the Capital Budgeting Process

For a business manager, choosing what to invest in should not be an exercise of instinct. With capital budgeting methods, managers can appraise various projects simultaneously, with the end result indicating which one will have the highest impact on company value.

11 minute readContinue Reading
David Bradshaw

David Bradshaw

David is an expert in planning asset acquisitions, managing projects of up to $100m across the financial, real estate and consumer space.

Corporate Tax Reform and the Future of Valuation – Part II

In his first article on the effects of the new US corporate tax reform bill, Toptal Finance Expert Jacob Wright assessed one of the most important impacts of the reform: the changes to interest deductibility. In this follow-up article, he runs through some further thoughts related to the effects on capital expenditures, in addition to a more high-level assessment of what the optimal capital structure of the future will look like given these changes.

11 minute readContinue Reading
Jacob Wright

Jacob Wright

A CFA charterholder, Jake has participated in M&A transactions exceeding $500m and performed valuations for companies of all maturities.

Toptal Finance Expert

Neil Portus | CFA, CMA

Neil is a CFO for growth companies and a former equity analyst at Goldman Sachs in NY where he helped lead numerous transactions including Zipcar's $1.1 billion IPO. He was also an equity analyst at Barclays Capital & Lehman Brothers and began his career at a boutique investment bank (M&A, restructuring, debt financings). He's built his operational skills both as a startup founder and as the CFO of an East Africa-focused impact investment firm.
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