Toptal Management Consulting Blog

Valuation of private fintech startups is a step-by-step process that requires a holistic assessment of macro industrial factors and micro assumptions about the startup’s future prospects. Learn how to value fintech companies in a practical step-by-step manner with this working example for payments unicorn Transferwise.

In this article, Toptal Management Consultant Jacob Decter unpacks the concept of buyer power, one of the Five Forces that Michael Porter popularized in his now famous framework, providing useful insights and tips to businesses looking to stay ahead of the game and thrive.

Buying out the business you work for and then running it yourself doesn’t have to be a pipe dream. Management buyouts (MBOs) have been popular since the 1980s and, when aligned correctly, are appealing propositions for owners and motivated management teams.

This useful guide by Toptal Management Consultant Paul Ainsworth draws on 30+ years of experience as a CFO of large multinational companies to lay out the menu of options companies face in order to deal with foreign exchange exposure and manage risk effectively.

Compared to traditional financial services businesses, fintech startups require different valuation approaches. This article explores these differences and the best practices to apply when appraising a fintech investment.

Anyone vaguely familiar with the venture capital industry knows that down rounds are bad news. But what exactly are they, and why do they occur? What alternatives do founders have to avoid a down round?

Toptal Management Consultant Bechara Kara runs through the crowdfunding market’s recent milestones, highlighting some of the shortcomings that can potentially threaten crowdfunding as a tool for democratizing finance, concluding with suggestions for a balanced approach in promoting its evolution.

With both expected to go public in 2019, we look at Lyft vs Uber and how they would be valued on the public markets. This analysis also comprises an overview of their respective business models, finances, and expansion strategies.

Revenue-based financing allows an entrepreneur to repay an investment over time, to retake ownership of their business, and give a capped return to investors. With founders increasingly rejecting the scale-at-all-costs mentality, this article investigates the math of revenue-based investing and whether in VC it is possible to play averages over home runs.

Over the last few decades, the CFO role has changed profoundly. Beyond overseeing traditional finance functions, the modern CFO now partners with the CEO to drive organizational decision-making and strategy.

While selling one’s company can seem like a daunting and difficult task, there exists a proven model and framework that drives valuation to maximum levels and leads to deals successfully getting done. This post is a guide for those contemplating a sale, as to what are the primary and secondary valuation drivers in a sale and how the process is conducted.

Overdue receivables are one of the most common and serious frustrations entrepreneurs face. The hidden costs can be staggering, from lost time dealing with the problem to the cost of hiring dedicated experts, to the serious and long term damage to a business’ reputation with its clients. In this guide, we provide six steps all businesses should take to avoid the headache of overdue receivables.

The Python language has the functionality to consign many a VBA-filled spreadsheet, held together with sticky tape, to the recycle bin. Its ease of use and suitability for iterative development lends well to finance-based workflows. We delve into this and provides a brief tutorial.

As a venture investor, Natasha Ketabchi spends most of her day evaluating tech startups as potential investments. In early-stage investments, Natasha finds that the three things that matter most are team, product, and sales and marketing approach—including their go to market strategy. In this article, Natasha lifts the veil on what venture investors look for in a solid GTM plan.

Using the 2016 Wells Fargo Banking Scandal as an example, this article dissects the situation according to the principles of the three classic ethical theorists: Plato, Kant, and Mill. It then offers some suggestions on how to improve ethics in business.

Pricing strategy is one of the most important functions that any business engages in. Prices are a foundational element of a company’s revenues—If managed carefully, they can generate high profits and consequently cash. But setting prices appropriately is tricky, and when mistakes are made, companies suffer.

In this article, Toptal Management Consultant Dalibor Pajic draws on his 15+ year career in corporate finance to outline seven practical examples of when pricing strategy plays a crucial role, with the aim of illustrating how pricing decisions can be approached in different situations. Pending