Marcel joined me in running a set of strategy workshops last week, in Cairo and Upper Egypt. We are finding that we are being asked to provide more and more help to investors at the point of ‘buy’ or ‘sell’. Marcel has probably been engaged in over half the big deals in education, worldwide, over the last 2 years. That includes GEMS’ fund-raising and Nord Anglia’s purchase of WCL.
Sometimes, investors need analysis: what is the real value of this prospectus? what is missing? what is the risk? what will we face? He has the operational experience and the commercial nous to answer those questions.
Sometimes, investors need a Due Diligence exercise and we have built our own framework for that. We can readily field people and I have another team ready to go into North Africa in 2 weeks time, for a different investor.
And then we also do the follow-through post-sale where investors want us to collaborate on the Value Creation Plan, 100 day plans and commercial outlook.
The job is always about building relationships and trust, while digging into the commercial case. Our educational credentials, time and again, get us across the threshold and this work has become very enjoyable. In the latest case, we are working on Universities rather than schools and it is good to stretch those muscles again.
Let’s hope we get more chances in the coming year.
