Debt Advisory

We support you with all possible financing requirements:

• Growth financing/(leap) investment financing, 
• Financing as part of the reorganization of the shareholder structure and company succession (buy-out),
• Acquisition financing (share or asset deal),
• Project financing (recourse or non-recourse),
• Refinancing, 
• Contract amendments and term extensions (“amend & extend”),
• Recapitalizations,
• Distribution financing,
• Factoring, reverse factoring, leasing and other off-balance sheet financing,
• Restructuring of the liabilities side,
• Support in stress situations (e.g., upcoming restructurings)

Our range of services

We advise you transparently and independently on all steps of the process, thus relieving the strain on your resources. Our experts at the Debt Advisory Competence Center organize the entire competitive financing process and support you in asserting your interests.

Financing instruments:

In Germany, loans from banks, savings banks and credit unions continue to be the dominant source of financing. As an independent financing advisor, we can show you other/alternative financing options in addition to traditional bank financing. Our experts at the Debt Advisory Competence Center have extensive and long-standing experience in all conceivable financing instruments, provide you with completely independent advice and implement your financing project together with you.
 

If your company is looking to realign its financing and the search for a suitable financing strategy for your company has perhaps only just begun, we are also the right partner for you. Our experts at the Debt Advisory Competence Center will analyze your current situation and incorporate already planned projects and defined goals into the development of a new, long-term sustainable financing strategy.

As part of the development of a customized financing strategy, we will discuss a wide range of issues with you, including:

• Is the financing security/continuous financing also guaranteed in the long term? 
• Can the credit rating be improved by the financing structure?
• What is the debt capacity/maximum debt capacity?
• How can organic/inorganic growth be financed?
• Does it make sense to diversify the financing instruments?
• How can available collateral be used for financing in an optimal/resource-saving manner?
• How large should the group of financing partners be?

Do you need support in developing your business planning or would an independent view from the outside be helpful?

Whether in the context of an upcoming financing, a company acquisition/sale, a reorganization in the shareholder structure or an internal restructuring, our experts in the Debt Advisory Competence Center bring transparency and security to the decision-making process by supporting your company in the development of reliable, scenario planning. Benefit from our established best-practice standards and many years of experience in developing fully integrated business plans and financial models.

Even small model errors can sometimes have a significant impact on the validity of an entire corporate plan. Our experts at the Debt Advisory Competence Center therefore support you with planning plausibility checks and financial model reviews. This provides both you and, if required, potential financing and negotiating partners with maximum certainty and transparency with regard to existing plans – regardless of whether these are your own plans or those of the other party.

Concrete added value for your company, including:

• Complete integration of your financial model (P&L, balance sheet, cash flow),
• High flexibility in every phase of the planning process,
• Security and transparency in decision-making,
• Clarity with regard to all explicitly or implicitly used planning assumptions,
• Enabling meaningful plan/actual comparisons for long-term corporate and project success.
   

Your rating is a key determinant for your financing partners and the basis for (credit) decisions. Would you like transparency, to know your own rating or simply to better understand why your bank assesses your company’s creditworthiness differently than you do? Our experts at the Debt Advisory Competence Center use a rating tool certified by the German Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (“BaFin”), which serves as the basis for a well-founded assessment of your own creditworthiness/rating: retrospective, current and prospective.

The BaFin-certified rating tool available to us is also used by a number of well-known banks. As is customary in the market, a distinction is made between quantitative and qualitative factors. Depending on your company's sector, rating-relevant key figures and the one-year “PD” (probability of default) of your company can be determined. The classification as investment grade or non-investment grade is particularly important, as this has implications for the financing costs, the available financing instruments and the financing structure.

Concrete added value for your company, including:

• Sound assessment of your creditworthiness,
• Classification of your company in an industry comparison (benchmarking),
• Simulation of certain measures’ effects on the rating score, 
• Negotiating position with financing partners on an equal footing.

Sustainability, energy, environment, innovation, digitalization, infrastructure – the eligible topics are just as diverse as the associated public funding instruments (including grants, financing, guarantees). Funding programs are offered in particular by

• Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW), 
• the European Investment Bank (EIB),
• the (state-owned) development/investment banks,
• the (state-owned) guarantee banks,
• the (state-owned) investment companies,
• the sector-specific development/investment banks,
• the federal government (e.g., via the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy),
• the federal states, and
• the European Union.

Benefit from attractive conditions by applying for funding before the project begins. It is generally also possible to combine several public subsidies in compliance with EU aid limits.
 

When concluding a financing agreement, you generally enter into a wide range of different 
obligations/covenants, including

• information/reporting obligations, 
• financial covenants,
• general obligations (including restrictions on raising further financing, restrictions on the collateralization of assets, restrictions on acquisitions, etc.), and
• representations and warranties.

Our experts at the Debt Advisory Competence Center analyze (if necessary, with the involvement of our legal advisors) your financing agreements and your reporting for market conformity, identify optimization potential and help you to meet your contractual obligations with sufficient certainty. Among other things, we create

• a clear understanding of “dos” and “don'ts”,
• improved time and resource management, 
• a consistently high level of quality in communication with financing partners, and
• a homogenization of financing contracts.
   

Do you see a risk for your company that (i) contractual obligations, including financial covenants, cannot be met or (ii) financing partners or trade credit insurers intend to reduce or even terminate agreed credit lines or (iii) interest and repayments can no longer be made on time (ability to service debt)? Our experts at the Debt Advisory Competence Center will also be happy to assist you in stress situations (amendments/waiver requests) through to restructuring.

The sooner you start to take action and consider alternative solutions, the better the chances to avoid a veritable crisis. You should therefore contact our experts from the Debt Advisory Competence Center if discussions with your financing partners start to become difficult or if you need to find a way out of a delicate situation. Proactive but targeted communication is particularly important in weaker economic situations.

If your company's crisis situation has already deepened, the experts from our Competence Center Restructuring will also be happy to assist you. Thus, you receive everything from a single source across multiple teams.
 

Many well-known clients from all sectors have already placed their trust in our Debt Advisory team’s advisory services. We have experience with financing volumes in a wide range of size categories. Our clients include

• medium-sized companies and entrepreneurs, 
• owner-managed companies,
• large companies and listed companies,
• portfolio companies of private equity funds, as well as
• companies with a start-up character.
   

At Baker Tilly, we work exclusively in the interests of our clients. It goes without saying that we act completely independently of financing partners and are free of any conflicts of interest. Benefit from our reputation, our excellent contacts to the financing partners’ decision-makers and our extensive, resilient network.