The idea takes shape, agile financial management software
From August 2013, our relationship with Excel deepened for better and worse, which ultimately led to the birth of the Finadeck story. Financial management software integrated with accounting programs available on the market were difficult to use, inflexible, and expensive to implement, which is why most reporting and forecasting ended up being done in Excel.
In Excel, the main headaches were data updates, balance sheet planning, and sharing the desired permissions with profit-responsible managers when the company had multiple cost centers. Corporate groups and conglomerates were a story of their own, whose Excel files grew quite large.
Creating an income budget can be done even on graph paper, but when you start planning the balance sheet, which allows the company to create a cash flow forecast, the squares on the graph paper often run out. In summary, although Excel with its macros and formulas is an extremely good tool for data processing, it is not the most optimal or dynamic tool for SME financial management.
The idea for agile and dynamic financial management software began to form while deepening my Excel skills. At that time, I was working at Trust Kapital Group (now Ropo Capital), where I provided accounting and financial management services to SMEs and got to explore the software available on the market more closely.
Refining the idea
When a well-started accounting firm in Finland moved out of the group through a corporate acquisition, I moved to finance SMEs at OP corporate bank. During financing negotiations, I noticed that the lack of financial forecasts and reporting from SMEs also reflects on financiers when companies seek financing.
Empowered by data fragmentation and the large amount of so-called 'unnecessary' manual work, I decided to start compiling a data model in Excel during evenings and weekends, where historical income statement and balance sheet data, interim bookkeeping runs, income budget, and balance sheet investment plans with their planned financing sources were all combined dynamically into a logically linear model.
The financial management software sketched in Excel nicely formed all the tables and graphs for key figures as well as the cash flow statement, but the problem began to be that opening Excel itself took over half an hour due to large and unoptimized macros. However, the model was made and feedback on its functionality was gathered from entrepreneurs, accounting firms, and an auditor acquaintance who had become familiar along the way.
Team formation
The idea of incorporating an agile and easy-to-use SME financial management software into its current form was refined moment by moment during those almost three years of working at the corporate bank. However, coding skills were not found in-house, which is why the equation was still missing one quite essential part in addition to financing.
During comprehensive inquiries, I also asked our CrossFit gym if the gym owners knew any talented coders. By chance, they connected me with a very competent big data coder. Jari Kemi was then responsible for big data and IT infrastructure at China's largest dating app company.
The search continued and I finally met the already familiar talented coder Olli Tiihonen, who now handles our frontend, at a business school annual celebration. Olli had just returned from the United States, where he had been testing the market at a startup. After presenting the idea, we agreed to have coffee the following week, when Olli and I shook hands on building the software.
Team refinement
We knew that building the software would soon need more hands. In the summer of 2018, we happened to meet Tuomas Tirronen, who at the time was working for a European banking application company and was an exceptionally skilled backend coder.
After a pleasant evening, we agreed on lunch for the following week, as a result of which Tuomas, who proved worthy of praise, now serves as development director responsible for Finadeck's development. The prototype of Finadeck's first version was built by two coders in just under six months, without counting work hours.
Luck, success, and right timing, the story continues
These years in the Finadeck story have passed quickly and they have certainly been some of the most educational years in a certain way. It's a joy to see that Finadeck now helps over five hundred SMEs with financial management and reporting.
Thank you to our partners, customers, and collaborators for welcoming us and our software solution so well. Also, thank you for all the feedback that has helped us build the software in the direction you want.
The journey is just beginning and we want to build even higher quality collaboration with you in the future and bring you even more dynamic and easy-to-use financial management tools.
Wishing you a sunny continuation of spring,
Saku Pöllänen
CEO
