Capitalism’s Favorite Business Model

Brian Parks, Co-Founder and CEO of Bigfoot Capital discusses the pros and cons of different capital structures for B2B SaaS companies with Steve Keifer, CMO of Ordway and host of the Capitalism's Favorite Business Model podcast series.  Brian explores the tradeoffs between selling equity to venture capital firms and using debt to fund growth.  In addition, he provides insights on the process to raise debt, the financials that are reviewed in the underwriting process, and the ideal ratio of debt-to-equity for different stages.He also discusses a recent survey Bigfoot conducted of equity and debt firms about the current state of the market and how investors are thinking about deploying capital in the coming year.Learn more about Ordway - the finance platform for innovative business models - on our website.

Max Rosenberg, VP of Client Services at Ordway, discusses the considerations for implementing a recurring billing system on this episode of the Ordway podcast.  Discussion topics include automating sales tax calculations, connecting to payment gateways, and designing customer communications schedules.  He also provides insights on who is typically involved in the recurring billing project, how long implementation will take, and what the most common obstacles encountered include.Learn more about Ordway - the finance platform for innovative business models - on our website.

Phil Levy, CEO of Exact Payments⁠ and fintech expert shares the top three emerging payment technologies that finance leaders should have on their radar – 1) digital wallets, 2) network tokenization, and 3) real-time payments.  He also explains the payment facilitator (payfac) model and how it has greatly simplified the ability for SaaS companies to collect payments.Learn more about Ordway - the finance platform for innovative business models - on our website.

Steve Keifer, CMO of Ordway, explains how businesses have shifted from selling things “as-a-product” to delivering them “as-a-service.”  Some of the best examples are industries such as media and entertainment (think Netflix and Spotify) and technology (think Salesforce or AWS).  The biggest driver for the shift towards as-a-service is the desire to increase recurring revenue.  Investors award premiums to businesses with recurring revenue due the predictability and consistency produced from the long-term contracts with fixed monthly fees. Learn more about Ordway - the finance platform for innovative business models - on our website.

Ben Taylor, CEO and Co-Founder of SoftLedger and former accounting manager shares his views on the top challenges finance departments face in getting real-time data from their ERP systems.  He explains the vision behind SoftLedger's next-generation accounting platform and the advantages his new architecture provides with tackling complexities like multi-entity consolidation and foreign currency management.In the second half of the episode, Ben shares his lessons learned as a CEO and co-founder on topics ranging from culture and talent acquisition to go-to-market and product-led growth.  He also explains SoftLedger's innovative indirect model that enables other software vendors to access accounting features as-a-service with the company's API suite.Learn more about Ordway - the finance platform for innovative business models - on our website.

Dan Kullback,  CPA and Director of Solutions Engineering at Ordway, explains the importance of revenue recognition for SaaS businesses.  Audited GAAP financials are a critical requirement for raising growth equity, venture debt, and securing other credit arrangements.  Transitioning from cash to accrual accounting is one of the big transitions early-stage SaaS companies need to make as they scale up.In this episode, Dan shares the background and rationale for the recently introduced ASC 606 standard for US GAAP.  He also explores concepts such as deferred revenue, performance obligations, standalone selling prices, and the other complexities accountants at software companies must consider when making judgments about how to apply the standards. Learn more about Ordway - the finance platform for innovative business models - on our website.