Making a Film and TV Startup Investor-Ready for a £10m Raise

The situation

The business had built its reputation in production. The opportunity in front of it was in facility management — running the infrastructure that productions use rather than making the programmes themselves.

That is not an adjacent step. It is a different business wearing a familiar badge. Production is project-based, people-led and light on capital: you win a commission, assemble a team, deliver, disband. Facility management is capital-intensive, asset-led and long-horizon, with revenue measured in occupancy and utilisation rather than commissions won. The sector knowledge transfers. The business model does not.

Making that move required capital the business did not have, and raising that capital required a structure it did not yet have either.

What we found

The opportunity was real and the case for it was not written down. It existed in the founders' heads, in a form they could describe persuasively over a coffee and could not evidence in a document. That is the usual position, and it is fatal to a raise of any size. Investors do not fund an insight; they fund a plan they can test.

The organisation was shaped for the old model. The structure that works for project-based production — flexible, fast, built around a small core and freelance capacity — is not the structure that runs an asset. Different decisions need owning, at different speeds, by people with different accountability.

There was no one at the table an investor would recognise. For a raise of this scale, investors look as hard at who is around the business as at the business itself. A credible board is not decoration; it is part of the risk assessment.

What we did

Business planning. Turning the opportunity into a tested, evidenced plan — the market, the model, the numbers behind the numbers, and honest answers to the questions an investor was going to ask whether or not the plan addressed them.

Organisational design. Designing the structure the new business would need rather than the one it had, including which decisions sat where and what governance an institutional investor would expect to see.

Strategic advice, continuously, as the proposition developed. Plans of this kind are not written once.

An investor-ready pitch. The plan is the substance; the pitch is what gets it read. Both had to exist and they are not the same document.

An advisory board, appointed from our network. This is where a broad network earns its keep. We identified and helped appoint people whose experience the business needed and whose presence a funder would take seriously. For a company making a transition of this kind, an advisory board does two things at once: it supplies judgement the founders do not yet have in-house, and it signals to the market that serious people have looked at this and chosen to attach their names to it.

Where it stands

This engagement is live and we are not going to present it as finished. It is in its second year of advisory and the raise is in progress.

To date, three independent parties have shown interest in the investment. That is genuine progress on a £10m raise and it is not money in the bank, and we would rather say so plainly than imply a conclusion that has not happened yet. The work continues.

To be clear about our role: we advise on business planning, organisational design and strategy, and we make introductions through our network. We are not regulated financial advisers, and the transaction itself is run with appropriate corporate finance and legal counsel.

What makes this one different

This was a genuine startup, in a sector outside the manufacturing base where most of our work sits. We took it on that basis openly.

What transferred was not sector knowledge — it was the disciplines. Whether a business makes aerospace components or runs production facilities, the questions an investor asks are the same: is the opportunity real, can this team execute it, does the structure support the plan, and who else believes you. Business planning, organisational design and governance are not industry-specific, and a reader in any sector should take that as the point rather than as a caveat.

Frequently asked questions

Do you only work with manufacturers?

Most of our work is in manufacturing, aerospace and defence, and that is where our operating experience sits. The disciplines in this engagement — planning, structure, governance, preparing a business to be funded — are not sector-specific. Where deep sector knowledge is genuinely the thing required, we will say so.

What does an advisory board actually add to a raise?

Two things. Judgement the founders do not have in-house, and credibility. An investor assessing a company making a model transition is weighing execution risk above almost everything else, and the people around the table are evidence about that risk. Appointing the right ones is a network problem before it is a governance one.

How long does a raise of this size take?

Longer than founders expect. This one is in its second year with three interested parties and no concluded transaction. That is not unusual for institutional money at this level, particularly where the business is making a model transition rather than scaling something already proven.

Can you help us raise money?

We can make a business ready to be raised against and introduce it to our network, which is what the work here consists of. We are not regulated financial advisers and we do not replace a corporate finance house or your legal counsel.

We help early-stage businesses put in the planning, structure and governance that investors expect. See our startup structures and organisational design services, or get in touch.