FirstCapital | Our Service - Raising Capital

Raising Capital

Most investors will review hundreds of potential investment opportunities every year, and will only invest in 1-2% of these. Our success rates over a decade in this market are over 90%, so if you are seeking money, you can significantly improve your chances of being successful by engaging with us. We are active in raising money for our clients on a day-to-day basis. Through our established network of contacts within the investment community, we have intimate knowledge of their investment criteria and current interests, enabling us to quickly identify the right potential investors for you. But an introduction in itself doesn't get the deal done at the best price. Our skills in articulating the compelling investment opportunity, coaching your management teams, supporting your negotiations and project managing the due diligence to close, enable us to generate maximum value for you.

Our typical client profile

Business type: Established growing technology companies seeking development capital, growth equity or replacement capital
Transaction size: €5mn+ of new investment

Our unique approach

We have been successfully raising funding for clients for a decade. We have finely honed services and processes aimed at qualifying opportunities and managing mandates which ensure best possible results within the shortest possible timescales. Our success rates are among the highest in the market.

We combine strong commercial acumen with a profound understanding of the needs of investors and the market drivers to articulate and support a compelling investment opportunity.
We coach management teams on presentation skills to ensure the opportunity is presented to maximum effect.
We carefully qualify potential investors, setting up targeted roadshows to minimise management time, ensure competitive processes and secure genuine offers.
Understanding the needs and requirements of all stakeholders, including founders, CEOs and management teams and existing investors, we are able to align expectations around a common goal.
We provide skilled and experienced negotiation support to drive the best deal terms
We provide rigorous, end-to-end project management to keep processes on track, maintain momentum and ensure completion within planned timescales

Full scope service

FirstCapital offers a full scope fundraising service in our selected technology sectors. We provide you with considerable resource and support, from producing documentation to managing follow-up and initial due diligence, and we conduct rigorous project management to ensure a timely close. Our experienced directors lead each engagement from start to finish, providing the highest quality advice and negotiation skills at every stage in the process.

Preparation

The first stage of any engagement is rigorous preparation (typically 2-4 weeks). Working closely with you, we delve deeply into your company and management team, your technology, products and development strategy, your market and customers, and your finances and future projections. Leveraging our experience and sector expertise, we clearly articulate the investment opportunity in terms that the investors will understand and appreciate, ensuring that you are optimally positioned in your market. We facilitate candid discussions about your objectives, to ensure that all stakeholders are aligned in their expectations. A funding strategy that matches both your needs and the market appetite, according to your specific sector and development stage is developed and agreed.

We examine relevant transactions and listed company valuations on a global basis and use our knowledge of the return expectations.

An investment shortlist is agreed, based on our knowledge and analysis of the universe of potential investors, their investment criteria, current activity and preferences, and your requirements and characteristics.

We also coach your team such that you are completely prepared for the meetings and questions in the marketing phase.

Marketing

During the marketing phase (8-12 weeks), working with you we prepare high quality marketing materials. These typically comprise a teaser, an introductory presentation and more detailed presentations on specific issues to support initial due diligence. We leverage our relationships in the investment community to approach the most appropriate investors on your behalf and introduce you to the right people. We will brief you ahead of each meeting, and manage the post meeting follow-up and the initial due diligence, providing support throughout in order to minimise the drain on management resources.

Due diligence

Throughout this phase, we front negotiations with investors and use our experience of investor-specific issues and current market practices, to negotiate and secure maximum benefit for you. Once the terms are agreed, we project manage the due diligence process in order to see the transaction swiftly through to completion (8-12 weeks).

See our case studies for examples of the successful transactions we have delivered for our clients.

What Our Clients Say

“I had already worked very successfully with First Capital on a previous fundraising opportunity. Once again, I continue to be impressed with the business acumen and commercial judgement of their people, which has enabled i2O to balance the differing requirements of all our stakeholders and achieve an excellent overall result.”

Andy Phillipps, Chairman, i2O Water