Overhauling Finance Function and Evaluating M&A Opportunities
Mind the Product are a content, events, training and community business catering to product managers globally. They host large events, trainings and content on all continents, and they manage a community (ProductTank) of more than 200k product managers globally.
CHALLENGE
With a solid product and following under their belts, the Mind The Product team had ambitious growth plans. Unfortunately, they lacked financial clarity on how they were performing, as well as what it would take to achieve their goals.
SOLUTION
We approached the situation in two phases:
Phase 1 – Full Finance Overhaul
When we started working together, Mind the Product had experienced years of organic growth as a hobby business and lacked a focused finance function. We revised their chart of accounts and restated their historical information into a presentable format, as well as set up a new bookkeeping and expensing process so that all revenues and expenses could be traced to specific departments and events. We then built a comprehensive financial model and reporting suite which allowed us to help forecast the Company’s growth and report current trading.
Phase 2 – M&A Advisory & Diligence
Mind the Product saw strong organic growth, as part of this, we helped them set up operations in the US and Singapore. The Company were also approached to engage in strategic acquisitions to accelerate expansion. Ralston worked with the team to evaluate a key M&A opportunity in the US. We conducted financial due diligence and a strategic evaluation of the target, including recommendations on product & geographical fit, risks, valuation/return on investment expectations, and financing options. Based on this feedback the Company decided against the acquisition and doubled down on existing greenfield initiatives to drive their growth.
We were growing fast and needed to get serious about our finances. Ralston supported a number of major process improvements and helped us kickstart the journey to clarity and better decision making.
