Fortunately, with American Prudential Capital, we are able to help companies fund their stability and growth without such collateral.

We factor a company’s business-to-business accounts receivables (invoices) and provide them with 80% of the funds within 24 hours of approval. When the invoices are paid, we forward the remaining payment to the company minus an agreed upon fee.

No need to wait on clients to pay in 50.8 days (average) or worse!

No long term debt to repay!

No loss of ownership (equity) in your company or your soul!

Plus (+), we are much more fun to work with than someone who thinks that they can hold your soul hostage! Ahhh, you can really rest in peace.

]]> http://www.americanprudential.com/blog/2009/06/25/whats-your-business-worth/feed/ http://www.americanprudential.com/blog/2009/06/06/chromium-blog-danger-mac-and-linux-builds-available/ http://www.americanprudential.com/blog/2009/06/06/chromium-blog-danger-mac-and-linux-builds-available/#comments Sat, 06 Jun 2009 18:07:46 +0000 Eric Standlee http://www.americanprudential.com/?p=1021 In order to get more feedback from developers, we have early developer channel versions of Google Chrome for Mac OS X and Linux, but whatever you do, please DONT DOWNLOAD THEM Unless of course you are a developer or take great pleasure in incomplete, unpredictable, and potentially crashing software.

How incomplete? So incomplete that, among other things , you wont yet be able to view YouTube videos, change your privacy settings, set your default search provider, or even print.

Meanwhile, well get back to trying to get Google Chrome on these platforms stable enough for a beta release as soon as possible

via Chromium Blog: Danger: Mac and Linux builds available.

Instead, this can be a really great time to start a business, which is antithetical to what people presume. The down market can provide lower costs of real estate in terms of leasing space and lower labor costs because people are willing to work for less or for deferred payments with the option of equity.

Larger groups of people are open to taking that chance of being an entrepreneur, because being laid off is that kick in the pants they needed to take their idea to the next level. It is our belief that these people will be the ones to help lead the country out of this recession.

However, funding a new business can be a challenge. Asking for loans from your family can be a dangerous undertaking. After all, you want to be able to go home at Thanksgiving, no matter what happens!

Things to consider include whether you have enough operating capital so that if you have clients that don’t pay their invoices for 30, 60, or 90 days, you can still operate your business.

Or you can work with American Prudential Capital who can fund your accounts receivables immediately and collect your invoices while you focus on growing your business and creating success.

Small businesses created more than 60 percent of all new jobs in the past decade; today, about half of all private-sector jobs in the United States are at small companies like Moore’s. They generate more medical and technological patents per employee than big corporations, and history shows that they’re the first to begin hiring at the end of a recession. In short, small business has long fueled our country’s growth and expansion. But that’s the insidious trap of the current credit crunch — it’s threatening to squelch American innovation, which could hold the key to our recovery.

via Room to Grow: Economic Trouble for Small Businesses | Your Money Guide | Reader’s Digest.

Our firm specializes in funding these companies.  We can help.

Eric Standlee

“With banks in lockdown mode, small businesses with big potential are being stifled. Why Main Street innovators matter to us all.”
“If you want to understand what’s wrong with the economy, consider Deborah Moore. After working as a nurse-practitioner for 15 years, Moore launched a medical transcription company from her home seven years ago, mostly to be closer to her two kids. The company, called AccuStat EMR, has grown dramatically: Moore still handles transcription services, but she also helps hospitals transfer their records from paper files to electronic documents. Since the federal government wants most hospital records to be stored electronically by 2014, it’s a booming business. Moore has big clients, like the University of North Carolina Student Health Center, Beth Israel Hospital in Boston, and the Missouri Department of Corrections, and her revenue in 2008 was $35 million. Her only problem? She can’t get a loan.”

American Prudential Capital has 20 years of history on the side of businesses like this. We help these businesses grow despite their inability to get business loans.

Eric Standlee

Joe Heller of Brooke Companies, a good friend, invited me to come with him on the HCCTV talk show Dialogue Houston with Larry Payne.

This was a great opportunity to talk about the economy and about opportunities I see in the commercial business acquisition market.

Eric Standlee
VP Business Development

Eventually, however, the focus turns to money. To make things better is going to take money. The old adage that, “it takes money to make money,” is usually true. The question is, “whose money?” Initially, entrepreneurs turn to the readily available sources, friends and family. That is, they turn to friends and family after they have exhausted their personal funds. This usually works to get the business up and running.

The first sales come in and delivery occurs. Then the orders start to grow and the success of the business seems to ride on the wave of the daily cash flow. Eventually, receipts do not match expenses in a timely manner and the entrepreneur begins to think of finding additional capital.

Then comes one of the critical points in the development of the small business, the search for third party financing. Usually the budding entrepreneur goes to the bank that has been handling his or her business accounts. Unfortunately, the business is very young without a significant track record and without much equity built up.

No matter how much the banker likes the entrepreneur and no matter how much the banker believes in the product or service, the banker will not be able to justify lending money to the entrepreneur. Bankers are not without feelings; they hate saying “no” under any circumstances. The banker wants to keep the entrepreneur’s business.

But, banks are regulated and they are regulated for good reasons. Banks lend “other people’s money.” The money that I deposit today may very well be loaned to another business tomorrow. Banks need to be very careful. So they have formulas, ratios, guidelines and rules.

If the emerging entrepreneurial business has assets like certificates of deposit, land, or stocks and bonds, the banker can usually work out a loan of equal value backed by the assets. But few entrepreneurs have such assets available to pledge to the bank. So, the banker has to turn down the loan application. Where does the entrepreneur turn then?

The enthusiastic entrepreneur usually begins to seek equity investors at this point. This has some advantages. It is available to some early stage ventures. It has disadvantages, too. The entrepreneur will most certainly lose control of the company. The equity taken at this early stage will require majority control.

Now, loss of majority control is OK if the entrepreneur and the investors have the same exit strategy. Usually, they do not. Usually, the entrepreneur is thinking long term and the early stage investor is thinking 5 years maximum. Five years passes very quickly as the entrepreneur works thorough business cycles, economic cycles, personnel cycles and ever growing competition.

The problem is that at the end of a very short period of time in the life of the business, the entrepreneur is back at square one trying to raise more money. Only this time the entrepreneur needs to raise enough money to take out the investors and ensure the survival of the business. This brings a whole new group of investors and with them new exit strategies.

Is there any other way? For some businesses, the answer is a resounding YES, THERE IS. If the business started by the entrepreneur is a business-to-business venture, in other words, if the business sells its goods and services to other businesses, then the answer is a definite YES. The entrepreneur can sell his or her completed invoices to a factor at a discount.

The advantages are many. The most important advantage is that by selling the invoices the entrepreneur gets immediate cash. No long-term debt is created, no loss of equity occurs, control does not go to a third party, no “exit strategy” issues arise, lines are easily increased, and it is self-liquidating, to mention just a few.

Entrepreneurs whose businesses engage in B2B, business-to-business, sales have the opportunity to grow their enterprises under the “Self-Sustaining Business Model” for several years, and sometimes for the life of the business. Factoring works in the entrepreneurs favor.