Preparing your business’ vision

When the Leadership Team have completed the “who is this business” document, the next task is to document the VISION.

Many SMEs find that assistance from an experienced virtual CFO is beneficial in the preparation of the ‘vision document’ comprising:

Business plan: a “living document”

Predictive accounting reports: budgets – Key drivers – cash flow forecasts – projected balance sheets

This series of reports is the ‘financial interpretation’ of the Business Plan. Your advisor could act as the ‘financial storyteller’ by being able to utilise the projected balance sheet, to identify what your company’s balance sheet will look like in three or five years’ time, if the business is able to perform to the targets that have been set.

Analysis of the Financial Projections – the leadership team will want to know what all this means. Is the company going to require additional funding? If so what sort of funding – loans or equity capital?

A key question is: does the company have spare assets that could be offered as security for a loan?

Is the company able to apply for a government grant because of research activities that the company has been undertaking?

Another funding opportunity is to raise capital direct from the public.

There are three main opportunities for capital raising by SME companies. These should be explored to determine which one (if any) is suitable for your company to utilise:

Section 708 of the Corporations Act: enables a company to raise up to $2M from a maximum of 20 investors in 12 months.

Early Stage Innovation Company: If the company’s young and has been involved in Research and Development for innovative activities the ESIC process could work.

Crowd Sourced Funding Equity Raising: if your company’s turnover is under $25M and the gross value of assets is under $25M, the company could raise up to $5M in 12 months by being assessed as eligible to utilise CSF equity raising.

These are some of the issues that need to be considered as you prepare the ‘Vision Statement’ for the company.

Towers Business Development can assist your company on this process. To find out more, contact us on 1800 232 088 or email .