Simple Startup and SME Forecast Business Plan
The best practice provides you with a template to easily create a full business plan with forecast P&L, Net Working Capital and Cash Flow Statement on a monthly basis over 5 years.
The model is generic and gives a solid base to any entrepreneur looking to pull together a BP as long as the business does not involve inventory which has not been modelled in this tool.
All the inputs required by the user are clearly identified with a specific cell color.
The model starts with revenue and takes number of customers and average value per customer as an input. The model then automatically computes revenue along with VAT which will impact your Net Working Capital and is very often overlooked by entrepreneurs, even though it has a serious impact on cash generation.
Moving to Gross Profit, the user will be required to input a % of commission on sales (if any) and to assess COGS as a % of revenue. Once again VAT is calculated on COGS.
The model then allows the user to define the annual salary of his / her future employees, and to indicate FTE for each month. The total cost is calculated taking into account the % of oncost on gross salary paid by the company.
Next is the Opex tab which simply allows the user to input forecast opex amount for main categories of Opex commonly encountered in any businesses. I have also left additional lines that you can fully personalise. You are of course encouraged to see what's the best way for your business to assess opex and to input your cost with the help of a formula (eg. as a % of revenue)
We then move to the Capex section. In this section after inputting the amount of Capex planned and the Asset Lifetime for each asset class, the model will automatically calculate Depreciation using the straight line basis.
Next is the Net Working Capital, which is often overlooked by start-uper even though it has a huge importance in cash flow generation. The model allows you to input the delay of payment from your customers (in days) and payment delay to pay your COGS supplier and your sales commission. The model also includes an input where you will estimate an allowance for prepaid expense as a % of Opex. This is to allow for generic costs paid in advance (eg. insurance, deposit etc)
The next tab lays out a P&L where you are able to input Interest Costs if you intend to raise debt.
Finally the last tab is a statement of net cash flow which will allow you to forecast and understand your cash generation and cash need.
On top of that, at the beginning of the excel file you will find a couple of "output" sheets where I have laid out a nice looking P&L with KPI's and movements, along with a nice visual of your Revenue, Gross Profit and EBITDA on charts.
