What Do We Do?
We provide objective and experienced communications consulting to companies going public.
We have a proven ability to synthesize messaging, strategic imperatives and corporate branding across the IPO communications platform. We craft strategic investor relations plans, shape investor presentations and secure high-profile coverage with key media outlets. We work and interface with all functional areas pertinent to the successful launch of any IPO: bankers, equity capital markets, the executive office of the CEO, and the internal communication entities within the company going public itself. We believe our knowledge of IR, financial media, branding and roadshow execution is rare, if not unique.

We give practical hands-on guidance to how best communicate to external and internal stakeholders during an IPO. We coördinate, communicate, create and produce to help prepare our clients and their messages in an IPO environment. Alongside other advisors such as investment banks and external legal counsel, we write strategic messaging briefs, investor speeches, coach speaker teams, launch and protect brands, and conduct simulations involving contact with investor, analyst and media audiences. We perform tasks that investment bankers, generally speaking, do not perform. We believe this benefits the entire working group as we all aim for the same goal: to achieve fair and accurate valuation. For performance leaders or those with a perceived brand advantage, we are especially valuable partners.

In contrast to our strategic services, we also plan and manage all of the air, ground, and audiovisual requirements during an IPO. There can be hundreds of transfers from Point A to Point B. A delay can hold up meetings and thus potentially harms credibility as investors ask if you can’t make a meeting on time how can you run a public company? We work hard to ensure this question does not arise. We ensure any computer, projection and audio equipment is functioning well and that all prospectuses (or “reds”) are available for every meeting. We guarantee everything will work and work well. We ensure the CEO and CFO are focused on but one goal: delivering their story without regrets.


What Have We Done?
Our work on some of the most interesting, notable and challenging transactions includes work with some of the most intelligent and successful management teams and bankers. For five consecutive years, our clients have been awarded the most prestigious honor awarded in our industry: Best IPO Communications of the Year. This is honor is granted by Investor Relations Magazine, the leading publication in our industry. To our knowledge, no other firm can make this claim.

The principals of our firm represent three generations of IPO consultants. We believe no other firm has our depth of experience or our consistent results.


top of page -|- home


The Process

To those working on the inside of a deal, we are very helpful cogs in a complex wheel.

We reduce transaction execution risk by ensuring the issuer’s management team is singularly focused and prepared to meet institutional investors by making a faithful impression the first time. For the weeks leading up to the roadshow we are focused on the investor presentation, and work with management on their delivery in a variety of meeting environments. We work with the lead manager(s) to prepare the roadshow schedule and organize the elements that are necessary to ensure each transfer from meeting to meeting is in place.

To those involved with the deal peripherally, we are often behind the scenes, all but invisible. We do not issue press releases or publicize our engagements.

Shortly after we are retained, we host a conference call with the lead manager(s) to explain our role and set expectations relating to our strategic, branding and travel services and who will be responsible for performing what duty. Thereafter, the process is seamless.

We excel at working with large teams. Recent mandates have involved two simultaneously traveling speaker groups accompanied by bankers from three lead managers and two co-leads. Another recent M&A project involved planning, coordinating and executing a six-team, 90 city roadshow with all teams travelling simultaneously. We amalgamate and manage the information obtained by these multiple inputs, and ensure the lead-managers and issuer have an auditable trail of data relating to the roadshow and its evolution.

We work closely with banking teams to help thoroughly prepare management teams and their stories. We are experts at designing, scripting and producing investor presentations. We believe our objectivity allows us to identify material weaknesses in a story and provide a rational remedy. Since many of the deals we work on are co-lead managed, this can be helpful.

top of page -|- home


Our Competitive Advantage

Experience + Experience + Results
Compared to our competition, we believe we possess three primary strategic advantages:

1) Depth of Experience: We have core teams that have 40 years of combined experience that work with clients on the day-to-day preparation and execution. This substantial level of experience affords us the ability to anticipate unseen circumstances, some of which can be unnecessarily dramatic. Our project leaders have at least one decade of experience with assisting companies through the IPO process.

2) Proprietary, First-Hand Knowledge: We have first-hand experience of the IPO process, having worked as IROs at companies going public ourselves. Our senior staff has IR, strategy, finance and creative backgrounds. Our senior staff has an ownership interest in our firm, thus strongly aligning our team with our primary mandate of delivering exceptional service and results.

3) Solid Results: The results achieved by our clients – on domestic and global stages – speak for themselves. We have a proven track record of assisting leading US and Canadian companies in their endeavors to go public and have successfully launched some of the most challenging deals. Our clients have been recognized as IPO communication leaders through five consecutive years of IR awards.

We believe these three factors provide a material advantage to the working group and elevate, beyond the norm, the typical IPO roadshow campaign, Investor Day or secondary offering.


top of page -|- home


Our Work

Why Retain Us?
Your company would retain us if you have determined that a roadshow through US or international financial centers would yield a public listing, most commonly achieved through hundreds of millions (or billions) in capital raised. You are a company seeking a listing on a US, Canadian, or Asian stock exchange through an initial public offering or a related transaction involving a roadshow (through the filing of an S-1, S-4, S-3, or H-shares F-1). You must command the respect and sometimes jaded institutional investors who have the capital necessary for a meaningful investment, or have clients that do.

We are generally recommended to issuers through a bulge bracket investment bank or the company’s Investor Relations or Public Relations advisors. If we sense a good match by virtue of our prior experience with similar companies, we may reach out to issuers or their bankers directly.

We are all about results. We have to be. There are few businesses where results are as immediate, as measurable or as public. Either you priced your transaction appropriately and raised the capital or you didn't. In fourteen years, virtually all our engagements have passed that pivotal test. The Investor Days and Analyst conferences with which we are involved also produce consistently positive results.

We are a leading authority on the IPO process and have a long track record of planning, coördinating, and executing all aspects of transaction roadshows. Most of our mandates are IPOs and secondaries in the three hundred million to two billion dollar range. Eighty percent of the offerings we work on are equity deals, primarily in the United States and Canada.

top of page -|- home


How we work

As our clients, your success depends on working closely with both your banking team and us. Often, we may be on-site with you for weeks or months. We significantly improve your ability to communicate with investors, analysts and the financial media. Our depth of experience allows us to anticipate and defend against impediments that might arise.

Launching an IPO requires the coördination of several internal functions but senior management remains our primary connection. Nevertheless, during the course of our engagement, we typically interface and communicate with Investor Relations, Public Relations, Marketing, Finance, Legal, Corporate Development, Corporate Strategy and Communications. We provide one point of contact which is paramount to making swift progress when situations arise. We provide ongoing written briefs and updates which are circulated on an ongoing basis to the working group. This provides multi-disciplined teams with the necessary paperwork to stay on top of the project’s progress.

We are highly focused on providing superior service. Our specialists deliver the highest standards demanded by corporate finance teams in the world's most competitive markets. Few industries function in such exposed, highly-charged environments. Regulatory authorities, shareholders, directors, employees, the media and competitors all view the IPO process as a test of management’s competence. We believe the industry’s recognition of our clients and the post-IPO successes we have achieved support our view that we are leaders in IPO consulting.


top of page -|- home