Launch HN: Finley (YC W21) – Debt capital monitoring and reporting software

Hey I'm Jeremy, CEO of Finley. That’s exactly right--when I was a debt investor at Goldman Sachs (which is on the receiving end of these reports), I spent 30% of my week reviewing and correcting the reports that came in. All of that happened in Excel and required dozens of rounds of back-and-forth with borrowers. It's a really tough technical problem given data comes from a number of sources depending on a borrower's given industry. Given this dynamic, we're focused on fintech and proptech first, because that's where real-time data is most accessible

Great point - it’s hard to appreciate just how different debt financing is vs equity until you’re in it yourself. Unlike VC's, debt investors are optimizing for 0% of their investments to fail. This makes its way into the contract's negotiation process and final structure/requirements.

Our vision is to power the end-to-end debt financing process. We’re focused today on post-close monitoring/reporting, but our next module will be exactly what you’re asking: the negotiation + close of that contract. We’re well aware of this pain-point: growing startups can’t afford the 6-9 months it takes to get their money (after already agreeing to partner with their debt investor!).

Fortunately there’s strong incentive alignment at this point to put that money to work. We also think our current reporting/monitoring work will be leveraged to streamline that process (a lot of reporting requirements come up during due diligence / negotiation). Finally, it’s a natural product extension since we’ll help you close your facility then can automate your reporting immediately upon close.

I have nothing to offer other than "how do I invest"? Best of luck, looks like the race car already has, ahem, traction.

Hi Kevin, congrats on the launch! I'm the cofounder and CEO of FINSIGHT, one of the few... sustained (for lack of a better word)... entrants into the capital markets infrastructure space (we own Deal Roadshow which markets about roughly half of IPOs, 99% of ABS and 20% of corporate DCM new issue in the US).

My two cents on overall go to market:

1) Good job not mentioning AI/ML/Blockchain/Distributed Ledger anywhere on your website. This market does not trust black boxes or anything they do not understand. How you solve the problem is no one's business but yours, they just want the job done well.

2) Sales cycles are long, today is always the best day to begin prospecting clients. Every successful enterprise fintech company I know was built on strong outbound (cold calls and cold emails, conferences, etc), not inbound. This is not an industry where you can sit back and throw money at AdWords and Instagram. Put differently, your target customers are not looking for this solution so you have to find them and convince them why they need it.

3) The most important factor in winning new business here is social proof. Do whatever it takes to get it, even if it means giving it away for free. Get those logos on your website!

4) Never, ever cut out the banks and remove any site copy that could be mistaken for you doing it. I know of no startup that has succeeded in this endeavor and many have been destroyed for it (I don't want to mention names lest this comment offends some of these people).

5) As PG has written about previously, don't be afraid to do things that don't scale. I can run our whole company from a smart phone but I still have clients (including some from GS) that insist on emailing us to do things for them despite the fact it took them longer to to explain what they wanted over email than than log in and make the change. I don't care, people are more intelligent than machines. I actually find the clients that make us do the work for them to be the most loyal and supportive. That last mile of development to perfectly automate this workflow often isnt worth the brain damage and I would NEVER push the client to do it on their own if they don't want to. That's what they pay us for.

6) Your lights can be turned off overnight if BlueCoat's (Symantec > Broadridge) web filter categorizes you as anything remotely close to a virtual data room, file sharing or social networking site. Go ahead and get yourself categorized properly and monitor it regularly. Do the same for your email IP addresses.

7) I operate with the assumption that no one is going to log into my website (thankfully many do). Figure out a way to push value to them. Monitor space is the most expensive real estate per square inch in the world for this crowd.

8) Regarding your website: I think there is too much white space and scrolling. This market values content density (don't believe? look at bloomberg). I realize this is super subjective.

9) I found that focusing on value created resonated more than costs saved. As an owner of our company, I like saving money because it flows straight to our bottom line. Most people I pitch are not compensated that way and naturally don't care. Convince them they can make more money or execute better for their clients and their ears perk up.

I'm sure there's more... feel free to reach out and I would love to get a demo.