Toptal Management Consulting Blog

As environmental, social, and demographic factors increasingly put pressure on traditional food production, investors and entrepreneurs are turning to innovation. Many promising startups are emerging, all with a focus on producing food in a more efficient and sustainable way.

When a cash flow statement doesn’t balance, it can cause frustration and waste time. In this article, a Toptal management consultant with experience at PwC describes how to prepare a statement that always tallies correctly.

Education has rapidly evolved away from the red-brick schoolhouse model. About $7.0 billion was invested globally by VC funds into the edtech market in 2019. This is expected to grow 3x over the next decade. Where is the money going? What characteristics do new competitors need to be sustainable?

In industries seeing stagnant growth or a negative impact from uncontrollable, outside forces, many companies are turning to corporate venture capital as an alternative means to innovation. Yet, famed venture capitalist Fred Wilson once said that corporate venture capital was the “devil.”

The amount of money pouring into Agrifood tech has increased more than sixfold since 2012: from $3 billion to almost $18 billion. In the first part of this series, we examine the three changing conditions making this field ripe for innovation and analyze emerging technologies.

Since the introduction of index funds in the 1970s, the investment management industry has embraced the use of software to enhance its decision-making. With robo-advisors reaching further prominence, will machines replace humans in the world of wealth management?

Not many industries have undergone the same level of transformation as the music industry - technology has changed every facet of the industry. File streaming has been nothing short of a revolution. What can be learned from Spotify vs. SoundCloud?

Entrepreneurs have been hardcoded to aim at billion-dollar sized markets with their solutions. However, such lucrative markets will appeal to many others and thus, are hard to succeed in. Going after smaller market sizes may be the more logical path to success.

The EU economy is worth $15.5 trillion, 24 million companies operate within it, and there are 300 million online shoppers. Is this a market you should be in? If so, how do you serve the EU market while balancing customer service, cost, and complexity?

Looking to make your financial models more effective with better data visualization? Design principles can be effective tools in corporate decision-making.

Brand value is the value a business can sell an item above the price that the supply/demand curve dictates. This value is embedded into the company’s share price but can be uncovered using PEG analysis.

Tech firms have enjoyed a deluge of funding in the last few years. Fintech is no exception. Now is the time to see which companies are here to stay and can become profitable - there will be some necessary consolidation and perhaps some high-profile failures.

When something is not right in a business, it can be confusing knowing where to start to fix it. Objective frameworks like issue trees, funnel analysis, and business canvases provide an organized and data-driven way of getting to the root of a problem and give cast-iron evidence toward plotting a route forward.

Toptal Management Consultant and fundraising guru Jeffrey Fidelman put together a list of the top 5 pitch deck mistakes he sees most often. Within these common mistakes, Fidelman also highlights best practices and shows you how to write a perfect pitch deck.

Waterfalls are an integral part of real estate investment terms, dictating the hierarchy of how cash is distributed to investors and the transaction’s sponsors. When structured correctly—with aligned incentives—they ensure that the deal is set up to achieve outsize success.

How can you easily assess whether your business is ready for sale? Key questions need to be answered to make the sales process as smooth as possible. A checklist can help managers prepare.