With a background in investment banking, private equity and financial management, Alfonso always admired brave entrepreneurs who could create something out of nothing. He yearned for a less formal life and wanted to create a tool that could automate financial analysis, something he had wished for in his previous job. But identifying the right niche or user group to target for his dream tool was an interesting challenge.
"The universe of professionals conducting financial analysis is vast and diverse, making for a huge potential total addressable market but also it becomes hard to pinpoint a particular target audience, so I made it compatible enough that anyone who conducts financial analysis benefits from Qokoon in one way or another", Alfonso admits.
Thanks to the advent of the cloud, digitalisation and AI, Alfonso saw an opportunity to fill the gap in the market. And in a recent interview with ADSMEhub, he shared his inspiring entrepreneurial journey and the creation of Qokoon.
How It All Started
Alfonso's background and passion for the project helped him secure the necessary funding to turn his dream into a reality. Thanks to some successful investments in the stock market during COVID-19 he was able to invest his own money into Qokoon as an equity investment which contributed giving his friends and family the comfort to invest alongside him in Qokoon for a total investment of 700,000 pounds. Qokoon is fundraising again to speed up its development and growth efforts.
Qokoon's unique selling point is its ability to automate financial analysis and reporting, saving SMEs, VCs and banks time and money, whilst generating more thorough and comprehensive analyses and reports. A CEO was recently extremely grateful about Qokoon’s value and told Alfonso “I am much more comfortable now that I have visibility about my financials…I was driving blind before”.
The subscription-based service targets small and medium-sized enterprises that need financial analysis but lack the resources to do it effectively. Apart from improving their financial management, Alfonso figured that Qokoon can help SMEs and startups obtain debt or equity financing. He added more features including financial statement analysis, ratio analysis and cash flow analysis.
What Sets Qokoon Apart
During the interview, Alfonso emphasized that Qokoon saves a lot of time by automating financial analysis, as the system automatically links to accounting systems and also uploads Excel spreadsheets instantly. He also emphasized that the tool generates its own sentences explaining financial performance, for example telling users why profits are increasing or decreasing. “Some may say Qokoon is the ChatGPT of financial analysis”, Alfonso proudly states.
But, Qokoon can do so much more like cost alerts, anomaly detection, and dynamic dashboard, all of which make financial analysis more accessible and effective for SMEs, VCs, banks and other users conducting sophisticated financial analysis.
According to Alfonso, apart from sentence generation, there are several differentiators that make Qokoon stand out in the market. Firstly, Qokoon's cost alerts analyze all cost categories and determine which ones are affecting profitability negatively or positively, highlighting where users should be careful, and helping them manage their cost base and profits.
The system also has anomaly detection, which identifies several types of anomalies in profit and loss balance sheet and cash flow. Alfonso mentioned that the company has even detected bookkeeping errors and fraudulent activity on a couple of occasions.
Qokoon's instant generation of monthly finance reports with balance sheet analysis, month analysis, year-to-date analysis, last 12-month analysis, trends, charts, and written commentary is a game-changer. Users can quickly get an understanding of, and explain, their financial performance and plan accordingly. Qokoon is a great tool to seamlessly and digitally report to VC investors and banks.
Lastly, the company's dynamic dashboard enables users to drill down to the source of what is happening with charts and easy-to-understand navigation. Alfonso emphasized that Qokoon is easy to use, and even someone with no accountancy knowledge could navigate the dashboard and understand its features. But, to help entrepreneurs and managers, Qokoon offers a one day course teaching how to understand and manage company finances using its software. (even attendees have said “it was fun!”).
Market Research & Growth
Qokoon approaches market research and identifies opportunities in a unique way, by leveraging crises. Alfonso explained that he reads a lot about the FinTech industry, banks, and the need for digitalization. They look for opportunities to leverage their services wherever possible, such as currently offering all their features for free to startups and venture capitalists who have been affected by the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank.
They also use case studies, such as the one they have created for the Silicon Valley Bank collapse, to visualize with charts and graphs the early warning signs that could have been detected through Qokoon. Qokoon is not limited to private companies as they can analyze public companies too, which is great for stock market investors.
Despite facing challenges, such as identifying the right user group to target (the famous and elusive product-market-fit), Qokoon is starting to generate the right attention from the right users. Alfonso's vision and dedication have the potential to revolutionize the way financial analysis is performed and to help businesses succeed in an ever-changing world.
Future Plans & Expectations
Looking towards the future, Alfonso has big plans for Qokoon. He plans to offer Qokoon's services to banks and venture capital and private equity firms, as well as to any institution conducting sophisticated financial analysis, such as investment banks and loan traders.
Alfonso believes that Qokoon's ability to automate financial analysis and generate instant reports can benefit businesses of all sizes, and he hopes to make Qokoon the go-to tool for financial analysis and reporting.
Qokoon's journey is only starting! Alfonso Alfonso's vision and passion for creating a revolutionary financial analysis tool have led to the creation of Qokoon, a game-changing tool for SMEs, their banks and their investors. To this end, Qokoon wants to improve SME access to bank borrowing and it has just released a feature that estimates how much a company could borrow and instantly prepares the financial report to accompany a loan application.
With its innovative features and user-friendly interface, Qokoon provides real and tangible value and has the potential to help businesses succeed and thrive in an ever-changing market.
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