Business Turnaround

How can you turnaround your business performance?  Should you cut costs, source additional funds or talk to your customers and suppliers?  Could you delay tax payments?  If you keep going will you stay legalWhen should you ask for help?  In our experience, it is never too early to ask for help.  We are now doing Strategy sessions and cash flow forecasts for clients, and also offer our ‘Survive and Thrive workshop‘, please email me for more details.  Our experienced virtual finance directors will review your business, identify the critical success factors and then agree a recovery plan with you for both the short and medium term.  We can’t guarantee your success but we can help ensure that good businesses are given every chance to succeed.

Finance Director by glass windows

Growth companies sometimes get into difficulties through over trading, and a perfectly good business may be close to the edge through lack of forward forecasting and poor cash flow prediction.

vfdnet provides confidential services as follows:

  • Our one day helicopter review – gaining a quick overall perspective of the business with a verbal feedback at the end of the day
  • Advice on Directors personal liabilities
  • Detailed financial models to assess cash needs over the critical period
  • Advice on potential options if your business can not meet its debts as they fall due, such as Creditors Voluntary Arrangement, Members Voluntary Liquidation, Creditors Liquidation

The benefits are as follows:

  1. Protection of Directors and company from wrongful or fraudulent trading
  2. If there is a way forward our FDs will find it
  3. Precise, commercial advice at critical times

For tips on the ‘top ten warning signs’ read our newsletter on ‘How do you manage recovery

Case Study

How do business owners learn from other peoples situations?  We have several FDs currently involved in recovery situations and here is a client case study from a technology business one of our FDs has been working with:

“Mark joined the business in mid 2004 to improve our financial processes, reporting and forecasting.  Of particular concern was the cash flow management, which was, up to Mark’s arrival, ad hoc and unfocussed.  Mark’s clear and decisive analysis determined that the business had been trading insolvently and it was recommended to the Board that professional insolvency advice be sought.  Having placed the business in the hands of a high calibre liquidator in October 2004, Mark was integral to the team that was to ‘re-phoenix’ the business on the back of a sale and purchase agreement of the old company’s assets.  I am delighted to say that the business has since flourished and under the continued and professional financial stewardship from Mark has traded profitably in the past 2 quarters and is in a sound financial position.  Mark continues to drive the financial strategy of the business and is core to the management team and successful realisation of the business in the best interest of our investors”.

Dave Cole – CEO of IPV Limited, Cambridge

Mark continues to works as a part time FD in this business and the re-phoenixing of the business involved the injection of £750k of new funds.

Note: You can also download a factsheet on selling a business in html or pdf format.

 

Download .PDF

Finance Director by glass windows

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