Worried about your liquidity event?

Bringing in an investor or ceding control?

You've built a great business - now what?

Time for an upgrade?

Should you accept the unsolicited offer?

Should you acquire another business?

Need to buy out your
co-founder?

Planning a Management Buy-Out?

We're here to help when it matters

Creating value for you and your business

We help with transformative transactions

We help CEOs, boards and investors originate, evaluate and carry out investment, disposal and acquisition opportunities – with a speciality in resolving complex situations.

We don’t just do deals

With years of experience mentoring at the most senior levels, we guide you over the entire journey: nurturing high growth, optimising financial performance and preparing you for the right exit.

Our clients consistently come back for more

Unlike traditional transaction-focused corporate finance advisors, we build long-term relationships with our clients, spanning many milestones and transactions, sometimes over many years.

Next Steps

Contact us to find out how we can identify and build bespoke solutions to turn your business vision into a financial reality.

About us

Bespoke advice when business owners and leaders most need it.

Transformative financial transactions, such as the sale of the business, bringing in a new investor or merging with another company, don’t happen very often. We're here to help when it matters.

Who we are

We’re Little Venice Partners and we help CEOs and owners build the right corporate development solutions. Founded by an investor and an entrepreneur, we work closely with you to navigate through to a successful transaction. We’ve experience with Private Equity and Venture Capital; with leveraged buyouts and debt finance, over many decades of transaction experience in different countries and sectors.

How we work

A project team consists of an LVP partner and one or more staff who are experts in financial modelling, due diligence, project management and investor acquisition.

Who you are

If you’re like most entrepreneurs and company leaders, you’re probably more comfortable with your customers and your products than you are with big financial decisions. The ones that may determine your company’s or project’s ultimate success and your financial future.

Where we work

Much of our work is cross-border, and we’re used to working alongside tax, legal and accounting advisors from different legal systems and cultures. We’re based in London, with extensive connections into the investor and advisor communities, and we’re happy to work wherever our clients need us.

What we do

Building long-term relationships to resolve complex situations.

We work for CEOs, boards and investors to identify, structure and carry out transformative financial transactions, advising how to:

Source specialist (including project) finance
Acquire or merge with other companies
Dispose of part of the business
Bring in, change or exit investors
Design a successful exit for yourself, including carve-outs and other incentives

Develop public private partnership projects, working with diverse stakeholders to reach innovative solutions to infrastructure needs
Carry out Management Buy Out / Buy In, pre-packaged administration, recaps & restarts
Convert debt into equity and vice versa

How we are different

For us, quality advice comes first

M&A advisors and investment banks help sell businesses, mainly to larger companies. We are a corporate finance advisory firm: we help you first decide what to do, plan it carefully for the best outcome, and we then see it through to completion to your satisfaction.

We organise projects into four phases:

1) Problem Definition

At LVP we don't craft a solution until we understand fully what your challenges are. We take the time necessary to get to know you and your business, so we can ensure we are creating tailored and fitting solutions for you.

2) Planning

This stage can last weeks, months or even years, but arguably it’s the most important.
It’s when the objectives are agreed, the strategy set and the plan prepared. It’s also when alternatives are considered and the interests of all stakeholders taken into account. Sometimes, after considering all the alternatives, the best approach is to do nothing and we collectively need to have the courage to agree this could be an acceptable outcome. For example, if a capital raise can be postponed or even done without, long-term shareholders returns may be enhanced

3) Marketing

Once the strategy is set, we identify and approach potential investors, credit line providers and strategic partners to gauge their interest. We coordinate the flow of information, follow-up meetings and interaction. Working closely with you and your legal advisors, we help negotiate term sheets or Letters of intent so that you can decide who to move forward with. This phase typically lasts 2-3 months, although we have seen it done more quickly.

4) Transaction

Once a candidate partner has been selected, we remain closely involved in the transaction through to completion. This stage is often neglected and left to company executives, but the management of data request in due diligence and the robust negotiation of net working capital, warranties, indemnities, escrow, deferred consideration and earn-out provisions can make a dramatic difference to your returns.

Our Team

Partners

Antonie Paul Woodbury
Partner
+44 7801 750186

Specialities:

Equity investment, leveraged buyouts, debt and project finance; value creation and capital raising strategies; transaction negotiations.

David Frodsham
Partner
+44 7785 234352

Specialities:

Equity investment, cap table restructuring, working capital optimization, corporate growth strategies, financial strategy and messaging.

Staff

Dr Dominic Botten
Director

+44 7975 909110

Experience

Our Experience

This is the section of the website where you would normally see transaction ‘tombstones’, with logos and monetary values. Transactions are perhaps the end-all but we feel they shouldn’t be the be-all of financial advice. And we’re pleased to say that after our projects are completed, our customers are still very much alive, often coming back to us for more advice. So, the last thing we should do is put them in a cemetery. Instead, here’s a confidential glimpse at some of our recent work.

Financial optimisation

We can help you
improve your cash flows…

Identified €1m of annual operating cost savings and €1m of inefficient capital allocation in a €40m manufacturing firm.

…to avoid
unnecessary borrowing…

Developed a sustainable growth model for a fast-growing global technology company to maximise cash flow, which avoided the need for €10m of additional borrowing.

…and wasted
working capital.

Reduced the cash conversion cycle of an e-commerce firm by €9m over 3 years by optimising business processes.

We help the C-suite
understand what’s going on...

Revised and simplified the operating financial model of a €25m turnover technology company, enabling more accurate projections and financial stress testing.

...we have
infrastructure expertise…

Modelled a £100m port investment project for infrastructure clients, forecasting fishing fleet growth and the impact on revenues of a new oil field, within the constraints of quay length, ship sizes and available dockside area.

…and in digital infrastructure, too.

Developed the business plan and financial model for a £750m roll out in digital infrastructure.

Intelligent mentoring

We can help
you grow…

Built a growth and customer strategy for a global technology company, enabling EBITDA growth to accelerate from single digits to above 25% year on year.

...turn your
company around…

Developed and implemented a strategy to turn around a loss-making tech firm with declining revenues; within 18 months, revenues had doubled and gross profits had risen by €5m.

…prepare you
for a sale…

Added €40m to the value of a technology company when preparing it for sale, by streamlining operations, improving business plans and untangling its ownership structure.

…or find
another way.

Helped a founder-CEO navigate a €50m tech company through multiple financing and exit opportunities, converting an early-stage investment offer into a non-dilutive license agreement with a global technology giant.

We can even
help you save tax.

Devised a two-country ‘trombone’ structure for optimal wealth protection for a £50m family trust and worked with specialist advisors to reduce the risk of double taxation.

Transaction strategy

We can
sell your company…

Structured and executed the leveraged buyout of one founder of a global technology and services company by the others, then sold it to a PE firm for an enterprise value of €75m.

…help you find
add-on acquisitions…

Advised a €30m turnover manufacturing firm on a €6m acquisition of a technology bolt-on company; identified, valued and presented three potential £25m acquisitions to a global conglomerate.

…arrange an MBO…

Renegotiated the shareholders agreement on behalf of management to remove toxic investment terms, then arranged and executed a €20m management buyout of a manufacturing company.

…raise capital…

Developed and spun out a premium brand offering for a well-established B2C company, structured the capital raise and attracted multiple offers for 35% of the business.

…or find better ways to
maximise shareholder return.

Spun out non-core activities of a large tech company, enabling the group to be sold as separate units, for an overall 20% higher price.

We’ll even tell you when selling
isn’t the right thing to do.

Developed a valuation model for investors looking to exit a complex global manufacturing group with enterprise value of €65m, enabling a sub-optimal offer to be rejected.

Contact us to see how we can add value to your business.

Little Venice Partners LLP is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority.