MODULES
Nurture a continuously learning organisation
Kelp’s modular architecture spans the entire investment/fund lifecycle and every aspect of operations. We also work closely with our clients to co-create custom-fit solutions that draw from different modules/sub-modules to support their specific business needs.
Investment lifecycle
Investment lifecycle modules:
Deal Identification
This module enables clients to build and maintain a fully customised, proprietary database of potential investment targets. The Deal Identification module draws on data from a wide range of standard and/or customised data sources and uses sector and company-attractiveness rule engines (financial and non-financial) to provide users with custom views of sectors and companies.
Kelp allows users to classify companies in up to three tiers, depending on the level of granularity required for decision-making. Typical attractiveness rules focus on market characteristics such as size, growth, profitability and returns, or specific aspects such as consumer behaviour. There is no one-size-fits-all in devising rule engines – every firm is different – but the diversity and breadth of available data sources means that we can creatively devise rules engines to suit any client’s needs.
Deal Management
The Deal Management module helps effectively build, review and manage the deal pipeline. The module enables firms to configure a multi-stage pipeline to accommodate the different points at which the investment teams/firm/the IC reviews and inputs to decision-making. Typically, we see a 4–5-stage deal funnel: Kelp’s auto-generated shortlist based on the firm’s customised ‘rules engine’; pre-concept note; concept note; and a single or a multi-staged IC. Some or all of these steps are logically linked to enable efficient movement of data and decisions across the deal lifecycle..
Value Creation
The Value Creation module helps firms to understand their portfolio companies’ performance against the benchmarks/targets set in the underwriting decision. The module helps firms to separate priorities, goals, key strategic/operational levers and financial performance, and to selectively focus on one or more of these, allowing the user to monitor company performance at the desired level of granularity.
The Value Creation module is also a tool to interact and collaborate with the portfolio companies on a need basis and to call out and review progress against pre- and post-meeting action items. The module’s configurable and smart alerts and prompts provide users with real-time, shared visibility of performance, progress and key actions.
Leadership
The Leadership module supports investment firms with their leadership and internal hiring decisions for their portfolio companies.
It combines a wide range of external and internal leadership/candidate data with information accessed or created during a hiring lifecycle, including role specifications, lists of potential candidates, results of auto-profiling, summary views of shortlisted prospects, reference checks and assessments.
When firms are making a decision about a hire, the module allows for a quick review of each hiring panellist’s assessment and underlying rationale, which can then be compared with data-based insights gathered from identified data sources, and inputs from reference checks. The Leadership module can also be configured for smart parameter-setting, integrating individual’s performance with the hiring/assessment framework and enabling firms to continuously fine-tune their hiring processes.
Enterprise modules:
Productivity
Kelp’s Productivity tools help firms to maximise their time and accomplish more. Its many templates and software apps – including Tasks, Profile Book, OneNote, Scheduler and Projects – assist in systematising operational activities to be more efficient and methodical.
Some firms also use Kelp’s collaborative functions to help their teams and other contributors to unite in a cohesive way. At the click of a button, team members can check the status of a project, review schedules, share information, communicate and collaborate in real-time to get more done and contribute more to the business.
Investor Relations
The Investor Relations module to helps firms and their investors to view and analyse the performance of their investments. It helps firms to effectively manage relationships with existing investors by building and leveraging best-in-class custom-reporting capabilities, and to identify potential new investors in a targeted manner using a fully flexible CRM designed specifically for limited partners.
Additional Sub-modules:
Sector Expertise
- Evaluates level of expertise / capability in any given sector (based on deals done / evaluated, relevant experiences of senior professionals in the firm and other custom-defined factors)
- Provides a robust input for the firm to augment specific capabilities as required, to win deals or maximise value post investment
Missed Deals
- Captures key information of all deals done in the market and their performance since investment
- Summarises which deals were considered and rejected/lost and at which stage
Leadership Development
- Helps conduct reviews of CEO performance and capture analysis in a structured manner that can be leveraged to conduct well-informed development dialogues with the CEO
- Provides rich insights to fine-tune criteria for future CEO hiring/partnership
Profile Pager
- Helps to institutionalise relationships by capturing the details of interactions, prior engagements/conversations etc. with external stakeholders (candidates, vendors, consultants etc.),
- Reduces risk of relationships ‘walking out’ of the firm with key transitions
Gross to Net
- Helps optimise the spread between Gross and Net IRR; tracks fund’s performance against identified public-market benchmarks; provides return attribution at all levels
Performance Management System
- System-guided alignment between individual and firm goals/goal categories
- Supports goal review and assessment by multiple individuals, critical in a project-oriented organisation
- Reduces the impact of unconscious of biases through auto-performance scoring