Case
A new ambitious strategy required an Interim CFO to get the full overview
Company Profile
Industry: The company is one of the world’s premier business intelligence and analytics software companies with headquarter in Denmark
Size: The company has offices throughout the world. There are distribution offices in more than 12 countries worldwide and a thriving global community of partners and resellers
Interim position: CFO, Headquarter Aalborg, Denmark
Timeframe: 5 months, full time
Other: The company is owned by large Danish equity company
The Situation
Twenty years ago in Denmark, the founders of the international Business Intelligence software company set out on a mission to help companies perform better by empowering employees with data they needed to make better decisions. To do this, the company designed a way to deliver databased insights from multiple sources and provide information access for all employees throughout any organization.
This was one of the industry’s first business intelligence platforms. The seeds for the companys Decision Suite was planted and a cultural revolution of data for everyone emerged.
The company blossomed globally thanks to the Decision Suite’s seamless integration with Microsoft technologies and it has since expanded their footprint with inventive new enterprise business intelligence and analytics capabilities for all technological platforms and solution designs.
The founder of the company realized that the potential for the company could reach new heights with a new owner structure and therefore it was sold to a huge Danish equity company.
The equity company focus on investments in mature technology sectors, with a preference for B2B software companies with scalable business models that have reached profitability and have a strong growth track. The equity company employed a new CEO, a former CEO of one of the largest Danish software companies. Under the leadership of the new CEO the company grew from 100 million Euro to 300 million Euro with very high EBITDA earning.
The CEO decided to implement a new strategy for the company, to lead it to one of the world’s premier business intelligence and analytics software companies. To enable this, a new management team was required. This included an experienced international CFO.
The Challenge
One of the key positions that instantly needed to be filled in the new organization was a very detail orientated financial analysis, a strong and experienced CFO.
The key tasks for this position included the financial statements for the official annual year-end rapport within 8 weeks and the budget for the coming year immediately after his employment.
In addition, the CEO needed to prepare a budget for the next three years that should reflect the new strategy including foreign subsidiaries and underlying dealers and distributors. All historical accounts, financials and contractual aspects needed to be reviewed and appreciated, requiring great technical skills, determination and diplomacy.
The Solution
Time was of the essence and therefore an interim CFO via Nextt Management was the perfect solution.
Nextt Management presented top-candidates meeting all criteria within days and in less than two weeks interim CFO Carsten Greiffenberg started the new position.
The Results
- Official Yearend report was completed within 8 weeks
- Detail budget for coming year was completed within 12 weeks, where key employees was very involved in the full budget process
- Communication with equity owner was established through the CFO within the first months, with the effect, that the CEO was able to focus at the future strategy and implementation including employment of a new professional management team
- The CEO also used the Interim CFO to transfer the accumulated knowledge to the permanent CFO with great success
With deep experience, professionalism and speed the interim CFO was able to provide the results that enabled the CEO to very quickly get into the situation, decide options and define investment/investment scenarios based on reliable information.