Cooper Parry

Leading our Digital Transformation business across Salesforce, NetSuite, Data & Analytics and Cybersecurity.

Managing Director - Cooper Parry Digital

Leading all firm market activity across the venture capital ecosystem.

CP's Tech & High Growth platform is the UK's #1 accounting & advisory team for start-ups and scale-ups.

Partner - Head of Early Stage, Tech & High Growth

Middlesex Cricket

Board Observer

HM Revenue & Customs

Appointed to the board.

The Administrative Burdens Advisory Board (ABAB) is an independent board comprising members from a range of business backgrounds and professions who represent the small business community. The Administrative Burdens Advisory Board's goal is to make a noticeable difference for small business by supporting HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) to help make tax easier, quicker and simpler.

ABAB - Advisory Board Member

Labrys

Part of founding team.

Responsible for all finance implementation, structuring, corporate treasury, HR & incentives. Successfully raised and completed multi £m Seed Round before rolling off and handing over to full time CFO.

Now - Advisor to the Board.

Group CFO

Acclivity Advisors

Acclivity is a boutique advisory firm specialising in providing accountancy, taxation and consultancy services to entrepreneurs and high growth, early stage businesses both nationally and internationally.

Founder & Managing Director

HM Treasury

Consultative Committee member tasked with reviewing the current taxation system and providing meaningful insights that can result in a simplification of the regime.

Office of Tax Simplificiation -  Consultative Committee

Richmond Gatehouse LLP

1. Co-founder with a specific focus on early stage startups & High growth SME's.

- Full stack advisory, consisting of: structuring, accounting, (Corporate/Personal) direct/indirect taxes & systems. As well as strategic development, fund raising and founder matters.
- Particularly aim to build relationships and demystify accounting and taxation to non-finance professionals

2. Managing multi-office accountancy firm, business/brand development & strategic partnerships

3. Advising & mentoring both hopeful and established entrepreneurs on wide ranging matters including finance & strategy. In particular making meaningful introductions where beneficial.

Partner

Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

I engaged with various governmental departments, discussing frontline business matters and opportunities for innovation, in a forum facilitated by Vince Cable.

Member of Entrepreneur Forum led by the Secretary of State for Business

PricewaterhouseCoopers

- Private Equity, M&A (London)
- Tax (Jersey, Channel Islands)

Senior Associate

Managing Director, Cooper Parry Digital | Head of Early Stage, Tech & High Growth |

I lead our Digital business that supports clients across their Salesforce, NetSuite, Analytics & Cybersecurity needs.

I also lead market activity for CP in the Venture Capital ecosystem. 

Our specialist team works with Founders, CFOs and Boards of early stage, scale-up and high growth businesses, navigating challenges spanning finance, strategy, technology, and deal support. We are highly active in the scale-up ecosystem and have worked as the accounting partner for leading organisations and communities and have built community platforms such as TechCFO and VentureCEO.

I started my career at PwC, then established and ran successful early stage focussed firms such as Acclivity Advisors. Following the successful exit of Acclivity to Cooper Parry, where I am now a Managing Director.

I wrote the best selling book 'The Finance Playbook for Entrepreneurs', so that entrepreneurs of ALL backgrounds could benefit from the very best teachings. 

Thinking back, I can see how my family-business beginnings have influenced where I am today, teaching me primarily how to spin multiple plates at the same time, but more importantly the significance of being surrounded by the right people.  

This unique skillset has afforded me a number of Board positions across industries within public & private sectors. At present, these include:

1. Middlesex County Cricket Club (Board Observer, Chair of Growth Committee)
2. Queen Elizabeth's Global Schools (Chair, International Schools project)
3. Labrys (Advisor to the Board)
4. HM Revenue & Customs - ABAB (Board Member)

As well as the above, I advise Government on how to innovate for SMEs & entrepreneurs through consultative committees and forums.

All of these roles have shown me the value of sharing what I know beyond my own sector;

And so, I enjoy speaking at universities, schools, accelerators and incubators on a wide variety of relevant entrepreneurship related topics.

Asif Ahmed

Profitability isn't the ultimate validation.

That's a lesson you only learn the hard way.

After working with 500+ venture-backed start-ups, here's the uncomfortable truth:

The most dangerous position to get into? 

When your P&L looks perfect but your fundamentals are weak.

Here's why being cash-focused ultimately builds stronger businesses:

𝗣𝗿𝗼𝗳𝗶𝘁 𝗺𝗮𝘀𝗸𝘀 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗯𝗹𝗲𝗺𝘀. 𝗖𝗮𝘀𝗵 𝗲𝘅𝗽𝗼𝘀𝗲𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗺.

Companies obsessing over profitability develop lazy habits:

→ They don't know their unit economics deeply
→ They avoid hard decisions about efficiency  
→ They confuse "not losing money" with "building value"
→ They miss the difference between margin and runway

Meanwhile, cash-burning companies (done strategically) are forced to develop critical skills:

𝟭) 𝗥𝘂𝘁𝗵𝗹𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝗽𝗿𝗶𝗼𝗿𝗶𝘁𝗶𝘀𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻
Every pound spent requires justification. No budget bloat. No vanity projects.

𝟮) 𝗗𝗲𝗲𝗽 𝗺𝗲𝘁𝗿𝗶𝗰 𝗳𝗹𝘂𝗲𝗻𝗰𝘆  
They know CAC, LTV, payback period, and burn multiple empirically. These aren't just spreadsheet exercises, they're critical to survival.

𝟯) 𝗜𝗻𝘃𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗿-𝗴𝗿𝗮𝗱𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴
They must articulate value creation constantly. This clarity drives better decision-making at every level.

𝟰) 𝗙𝗼𝗿𝘄𝗮𝗿𝗱-𝗹𝗼𝗼𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗱𝗶𝘀𝗰𝗶𝗽𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗲
Cash management is predictive. Profit analysis is historical. One protects your future, the other reviews your past.

- - - -

The counterintuitive truth:

A company burning £100k/month with 24 months runway and crystal-clear metrics is stronger than a profitable company that doesn't know why it's profitable.

The difference is control.

Cash-focused founders know exactly:
→ How long they have to hit milestones
→ What drives their economics  
→ Where to deploy capital for maximum impact
→ When to accelerate or conserve

Profit-focused founders often know:
→ That they made money last month
→ (And hope it continues)

✅ One is building a machine. 
❌ The other is hoping the machine keeps running.

💡 What financial metric do you think founders obsess over that actually limits long-term success?

♻️ Repost to help others in your network ♻️

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✒️ Specifically for: Fast Scaling venture-backed founders & CFOs

Crypto Quantique

Leading the IoT cyber security startup's drive to find product-market fit.

- Leading customer discovery
- Advising CEO and board on go-to-market strategy
- Advising CEO on organisational planning
- Mentoring team members in marketing and sales

Interim Chief Product Officer

Nick Black

As an advisor to early stage founders and boards, I help:
- Find product-market fit 
- Empower founders to make big, hard decisions
- Design and execute high performing product/go-to-market strategies

Recent clients have included:
- Nourish Care --> Advising CEO around c-suite hiring
- Crypto Quantique --> Advising board and CEO as we find product-market fit
- Rain Instant Pay --> Adding 100s new engineering headcount before a $116M Series A
- Gaia GPS --> Acquired as part of $150M PE-backed transformation
- Caura --> Addressing 30M UK motorists after a £4M Series A investment
- Agency Analytics --> Scaling past 100 employees
- Wawibox --> Scaling after PE acquisition
- Siteimprove --> Re-launching product strategy after PE acquisition
- Harper --> Scaling after early-stage investment

Fractional CPO - AI and Deep Tech

Intel Ignite

Mentor to Intel Ignite's first London cohort of deep tech startups.

Mentor to Early Stage Deep Tech Startups

Deeptech Labs

ReJoule

ReJoule is a battery-tech startup that has secured more than $4.5M funding to develop a unique battery management and grading solution.

I advise ReJoule's founders on product strategy, fundraising, and growth.

Board Advisor

Strategy Supercharged Community

Entrepreneur in Residence

CloudMade

Co-Founder and board member of CloudMade leading to an acquisition by global car maker Stellantis.

Board Member

Scaled CloudMade after it was acquired by Valeo in 2016. Expanded sales and marketing into Germany, France, Japan and China. Setup a product management function between London and Kyiv.

Co-Founder and President

- Led engagements with car makers Renault, Stellantis, VW Group
- Drove complete re-think of product vision to develop a machine learning based personalisation platform for car makers
- Built a team of 12 product managers and designers who developed foundational ML models, infrastructure and UI/app layer for a first-of-its-kind automotive AI platform
- Built a team of 8 sales and marketing leaders who developed customer relationships in US, UK, France, Germany, Japan and China.

Co-Founder and Chief Product Officer

Raised Seed followed by €2.8M Series A (Sunstone) and €12M series B (Greylock, Intel Capital) to create CloudMade with the mission of empowering developers to build incredible location-based experiences using OpenStreetMap data.

Signed up 20,000 developers, built a location-based services platform from scratch, created the world's first map style editor that could serve maps at scale. Failed to convert developers into paying customers.

Co-Founder

Lazaridis Institute

Coaching Lazaridis Institute scale-ups to set their north star metric and build an aligned product strategy.

Mentor

Sama

Joined Sama pre-investment and scaled the go-to-market and product:

- Co-led a successful seed fundraise
- Led product management, launching new features + growing engagement 
- Advised founders on go-to-market strategy and hiring

Chief Product Officer

Mindstone

Mindstone lets anyone who's overwhelmed with online content learn faster by reducing information overload and making it easier to find and learn important information. The product advisory board meets quarterly to challenge and support leadership's process and methodology.

Advisory Board

The smartest deep tech founders need world-class commercial skills needed to succeed.

Finding-fit in deep tech takes a special blend of technical confidence and commercial drive.

As co-founder and CPO of CloudMade, a UK-based AI startup, I led sales, marketing and product management from founding to acquisition by Stellantis. Since then I've helped startups find fit, hire their first commercial leaders and scale.

I like to work side-by-side with founders to prioritize opportunities, optimize go-to-market strategies, and establish repeatable sales processes. As an interim commercial leader, I integrate seamlessly with startup teams, providing hands-on guidance and support across product, sales, and marketing.

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