Services

WHAT WE DO

We specialise in:

• Facilitating businesses to optimise their performance
• Sales Enablement and Optimisation
• Non-Executive mentoring
• M&A Lifecycles
• Funding Strategies
• Assisting businesses expanding their Operations

Backed up with exceptional international experience from a big four qualified Chartered Accountant with listed CFO experience.

Facilitating businesses to optimise their performance

“Prune and re-bloom”

• Cutting waste and inefficiency and investing in areas of strength
• Know how to go about this in Europe and the US

Optimising Team Performance

• Ensuring teams work efficiently and effectively across functions
• Drawing on Richard Francis’ skills of being an impartial and a trusted leader with exceptional motivational qualities

Clearing blockages and bottlenecks

• Being a catalyst for change
• Identifying those areas that are slowing your business down whether it be people or processes

Sales Enablement and Optimisation

• Helping sales people to be successful
• Structuring the deal in order to maximise future revenue
• Ensuring customers’ objectives are met whilst complying with the gold standard of software revenue recognition (SOP 97/2)
• Knowing when and when not to use the price book
• Specialise in software but can apply skills to other areas such as education and training

Non-Executive Mentoring

• Being your confidential and trusted advisor on strategic, sensitive and anxiety generating situations
• Focusing on those areas that right now are stopping you and your organisation being successful backed up by someone with sound financial acumen
• Experience in managing the Board and resolving Board disputes and disagreements
• Experience in managing tricky customer, staff and vendor relationships
• Can pin-point for you the operational blockages and how to clear them whether it be in sales, administration or dealing with external parties
• Impartial, confidential advice backed by a solid financial qualification

M&A

Expertise in the whole M&A lifecycle:

For companies looking to exit

Building an exit roadmap covering:

• Strategies to increase exit value
• Being “acquisition ready”
• Providing valuation models

Due Diligence

• Helping you manage this process so you can continue to run your business ensuring the standalone value of your business continues to grow
• Ensuring that what the potential acquirer is asking for is both reasonable and relevant

Price & Terms

• Getting the price right is difficult enough but negotiating the right terms can be even harder
• Utilising mediation skills to “unblock the unblockable”

For companies looking to acquire

Picking the right target

• Helping you assess the benefits and costs of adding the target business to your organisation

Due Diligence

• Coordinating this process ensuring focus on the areas that create the greatest risk

Price and Terms

• Assistance with price and how you structure it
• Being a focal point for the management of the legal process

Integration

• Working with you to ensure that what you bought really does add the intended value to your business
• Ensuring that the momentum of the business you acquired is not killed in the process

For companies looking to divest

Due diligence

• Coordinating this process
• Specialism is in software companies and with experience all parts of the M&A lifecycle through involvement in 8 transactions

Funding Strategy

The moment you have one other shareholder you have lost total control of your business. We can work with you to assess which source of funding is right for you whether it be:

• Debt (working capital and long-tem)
• Private Equity
• VC
• Angel Investors/High net worth individual (s)
• Grants
• Utilising the experience of Richard Francis as an Angel investor and member of various investor networks

Businesses Expanding their Operations

Setting up infrastructure

• Building up the finance structure in a cost efficient manner ensuring wherever possible use of best of breed outsourced providers utilising my extensive network
• Managing the process for set up of offices (where relevant)
• Set up of HR and legal (where relevant) organisation

Sales Operations

• Quota/Target setting process and rollout of plans
• Ensuring there is support to the sales force to process transactions in a timely manner

People

• Assistance in the interview process
• Working with correct in-country expertise to ensure that your new hires don’t end up being costly should you need to terminate positions later on

 

For a free discussion of how Francis Vienne could help your business, contact Richard Francis now