Scott Braybrook

Non-bank lender in the bridging finance space, providing short term finance for development, refurbishment and filling a gap in funding requirements. FCA approved owner managed business with a history of success in the alternative lending market.

Key Achievements

• Provided CFO support to placement of a new £100m finance facility alongside HNW and other funding to enable growth in balances from £20m.

• Pursuing other funding lines from PE/HNW/Warehouse lines from other funders

• Developing a finance team with little experience in supporting borrowing base or covenant monitoring

• Implemented a new finance system (Intacct) to move from spreadsheet support to integrated reporting dashboards and rapid consolidation of SPVs.

• Supporting development of new proprietary loan management software, retaining 51% ownership of future SaaS business.

• Developed strategy for new business line (commercial finance) to be implemented after new funding line secured.

• Set up and managed covenant monitoring for existing and new lines.

CONTRACTING/INTERIM/CONSULTANCY

I have been helping a variety of clients with various issues they face – Strategy review and recommendations, deputising for senior staff, Systems and team structure (Banner – owned by CBPE); Re-design finance processes, solve debtor problems, recruit new senior finance team (EFT Systems – privately owned); Mentor and coach FD, Review financing options, act as CFO (Andrews Property Group); Fund raising, model design, strategy review for a start up (Menna).

Key achievements across appointments

• Identify and report on issues created by rapid acquisition buy-and-build strategy, particularly in timeliness and accuracy of reporting. Assess effectiveness of strategy and prioritise resolution of key issues.

• Manage the audit process ensuring delivery to a greatly contracted timescale, including relationships with Senior Statutory Auditor

• Review overall group systems and reporting, and recommend overall improvements to meet all stakeholder requirements (internal, investors, funders)

• Manage through negotiations for the earn out of an acquired business.

• Recruit senior finance leaders and help design required team structure, reporting requirements, information flow and give strategy input for growth businesses.

• Review of banking options, using network of contacts from Financial Services days to guide on refinancing and operational banking requirements and possibilities.

• Prepared a full financial model and a significant part of the pitch deck for Menna, as they seek Angel/Seed investment into an exciting new product.

• Resolved long standing debt problems for EFT, unravelling poor work from a finance team that had to be exited or left the business. Working closely with the senior operational leaders and the family to restore trust in the output of the finance team. Aided collection of £750k outstanding debt.

• Aided the reporting against covenants to Shawbrook for a large invoice finance line.

• Led a Central Finance team of 15 covering Financial Control, Tax, Treasury, AP and Financial Reporting. This covered statutory & regulatory reporting, valuations, drawdown and compliance.

• Managed the audit process for 4 main entities and their subsidiaries, ensuring there were no overruns

• Improved controls within Treasury, and improved procedures for drawdowns by investee businesses.

• Completed technical projects on EIS schemes (investigated distributions of capital & reserves to correct statutory accounts at transactional level)

• Managed relationships with key stakeholders (NEDs, legal team, banks, auditors, tax advisors)