Financial leadership built for manufacturing and engineering companies that are ready to scale.

Works out what each unit actually costs to make, where margin leaks between quote and delivery, and why cash sits in inventory instead of the bank. Then fixes the reporting so those answers arrive monthly rather than at audit.

When you cannot say which products earn and which lose. Usually around multiple plants, a widening product range, capex plans, or when your bank starts asking harder questions than your accounts team can answer.

A finance manager closes the books, files returns and manages the accounts team. A CFO decides pricing, capex, borrowing and product mix from those books. Most mid-size Indian manufacturers have the first and need the second.

Depends on complexity, not turnover. Single plant, stable product line, one bank — outsourced works well and costs far less. Multiple plants, exports, heavy capex and several lenders eventually justify someone full-time.

Yes, and it is a large part of our work. The usual issues are business and family money running together, decisions made on gut and long memory, and reporting built for the founder rather than the bank.

Direct material and labour are the easy part. Most Indian manufacturers underload overhead — power, rejections, rework, machine time, factory salaries, depreciation. Get absorption right and product-level profitability often looks nothing like it did.

Compare quoted margin against realised margin per order. The gap is usually rejection and rework, unbilled scope, freight absorbed silently, or discounts given at dispatch. Track it per order and the pattern surfaces within a quarter.

Each plant reported as its own P&L — output, cost, yield, overhead absorption and contribution. Group-level numbers hide a loss-making plant behind a profitable one, sometimes for years.

Budget by cost head and plant, then review monthly with variance explained by volume, price and efficiency separately. Material cost rising because prices moved is a different problem from material cost rising because yield dropped.

Usually product mix before price. Once real per-unit cost is visible, some SKUs turn out to be loss-making at current pricing. Fixing mix, yield and overhead absorption moves margin faster than chasing revenue.

Because profit sits in inventory and receivables, not the bank. You pay for raw material now, convert it over weeks, then wait 60 to 90 days for payment. Growth makes this worse, not better.

Attack the cycle at all three points — tighten collections, hold less raw material and WIP, and negotiate supplier terms. Cutting the cash conversion cycle by two weeks often releases more cash than a new loan.

Measure holding, not just value. Ageing by SKU, WIP sitting between stages, and slow-moving stock nobody has written off. Most plants carry material bought for an order that changed.

Reorder levels based on actual consumption rather than habit, vendor terms matched to your collection cycle, and a hard look at slow movers. Bulk discounts frequently cost more in blocked cash than they save on price.

Forecast weekly, not monthly. Manufacturing cash moves in lumps — material purchases, salary, statutory dues, capex instalments. A monthly view hides the week where you are short.

Consistent numbers across returns, books and projections, explained variances, clean related-party disclosure and a credible cash forecast. Banks discount heavily for financials that need explaining in the meeting.

Present the working capital cycle, not just the P&L. Lenders fund the gap between paying suppliers and collecting from customers. Show that gap accurately with drawing power calculations and the case makes itself.

By testing the payback before the order goes out. Machine cost against added capacity, realistic utilisation, financing structure and cash impact through the payback period. Capex decided on capacity alone is how plants end up over-geared.

Track drawing power, utilisation, covenants and renewal dates in one place. Mid-size manufacturers routinely breach covenants they did not know applied, or pay for limits they never draw.

Planning and coordination, yes — input credit timing, GST cash impact on working capital, TDS scheduling. Filing stays with your CA. The point is stopping compliance from creating cash surprises.

A monthly MIS with plant-level P&L, product margin, inventory and WIP ageing, working capital cycle, and a rolling cash forecast. Fixed date each month, followed by a review with your leadership.

They keep handling entries, GST, payroll and statutory work. We set reporting formats, review output and take it into decisions. Most accounts teams get better under that structure, not displaced by it.

For the initial review, yes — costing cannot be understood from a ledger. After that, work runs remotely with periodic visits when capex, costing or a plant-level problem needs it.

Cash and reporting improve within 60 days, mostly through discipline. Costing and margin work takes a quarter, because the data has to be rebuilt before the answers are trustworthy.

A full-time CFO in India runs upwards of ₹40 lakh a year. This model costs a fraction of that. For a single-plant manufacturer under ₹100 crore, the economics rarely favour a full-time hire.