Manish Kapoor: Leveraging Years Of Experience To Address The Corporate Financial Challenges
Manish Kapoor
Chief Financial Officer
To make a significant contribution to a startup’s success story and create value for all its stakeholders, Manish Kapoor began his professional journey at HSS. Manish spoke exclusively to CEO Insights about his professional voyage and the hardships he faced while ascending the success ladder, here is an excerpt from the interaction.
Throw some light on your professional background and experience. What inspired you to venture into the finance domain and what drives you today?
In 1997, I joined Hughes Software Systems. It was in its early stages and was the initial period of the IT industry. In 1999, HSS went public and that really transformed me as a finance professional since the requirements of working in a listed company are enormous and learning is tremendous. In 2005, Hughes wanted to again set up a software company, in India, after they had to exit HSS. I was fortunate to join HSC as its Head of Finance. I have been with HSC since then and it has been a wonderful experience to build from scratch. Working with industry veterans in the leadership team, at HSC, has been an absolute pleasure.
Following the financial performance and journeys of companies had always been my interest area and being good at numbers, working in finance vertical was a direct fallout. From the beginning of my professional life, I had always wanted to make a significant contribution to the success story of a startup & create value for all its stakeholders (Shareholders, Employees, Customers, Vendors), something that I could do for HSC, that is what still drives me.
How would you define Hughes Systique Corporation as an organization and its position in the market? What is the unique proposition that your organization offers to clients?
HSC is a Digital Engineering services provider. CMMi Level 5, ISO 9001:2015, ISO 27001:2013, and PCMM Level 5 certified Hughes Systique Corporation(HSC) is an
award winning software solutions and services company that specializes in providing complete end-to-end product engineering services ranging from technology &product consulting, architecture, development, testing/ validation to technical support in the areas of Networking, Media Streaming, Retail, Automotive, IoT, Blockchain, Security and WiFi Engineering including 5G, NHG Solution & WiFi Analytics. HSC has its global headquarters in Rockville, MD, the US, and India headquarters in Delhi/NCR with development centres in Gurgaon and Bengaluru, India with best-in-class domain experts, system architects, and engineering teams.
Our Unique Positioning in the market: We are flexible & scalable. Being a part of the Echostar Hughes (NASDAQ: SATS) group of companies, HSC brings in the stability of a multibillion dollar group with the agility of a medium sized company. Unique value propositions that HSC offers are (i) Industry Expertise & Experience: Technical focus and domain knowledge, 300+ successful engagements (development to deployment of complex systems), (ii) Robust Solutions: Reduced time to market, streamlined processes improved quality, (iii) Flexible & Scalable: Agility, rapid deployment, Strict IPR protection norms, and Customer focused & cost optimized solutions.
What are the major challenges you have encountered so far in your journey? How did you overcome them to emerge as a successful professional?
I think, the biggest challenge in a startup world is managing cash judiciously and for the initial years, it was tough. Maybe we can add a line here how Manish as finance expert bailed the situation with his expertise & experience. The second most time-consuming thing was the number of Tax Litigations and Compliances, right from Transfer Pricing, Sales Tax to Service Tax, and more. It greys your hair much faster. At HSC, we started on a very strong note and for the first three years, we had exhilarating growth but then the 2008 meltdown happened, and we lost quite a few customers. It took us 3 - 4 years to get back on the growth path, sustaining the company in that period was extremely challenging but once we got out of it, there has been consistent growth and good cash generation.
Despite these challenges, because of the kind of values that we foster at HSC, we never had to cut any corners, for example, if there were ramp downs, we did not lay off any employee, we all worked as a team to get over the crisis. Also, I have a very good team with me which just
I believe that one of the most difficult tasks in the startup sector is managing capital wisely, the idea is once you have raise funds as a finance head one should ensure that you should reach Ebitda positive at the earliest and thus need for additional funding is minimized
Our Unique Positioning in the market: We are flexible & scalable. Being a part of the Echostar Hughes (NASDAQ: SATS) group of companies, HSC brings in the stability of a multibillion dollar group with the agility of a medium sized company. Unique value propositions that HSC offers are (i) Industry Expertise & Experience: Technical focus and domain knowledge, 300+ successful engagements (development to deployment of complex systems), (ii) Robust Solutions: Reduced time to market, streamlined processes improved quality, (iii) Flexible & Scalable: Agility, rapid deployment, Strict IPR protection norms, and Customer focused & cost optimized solutions.
What are the major challenges you have encountered so far in your journey? How did you overcome them to emerge as a successful professional?
I think, the biggest challenge in a startup world is managing cash judiciously and for the initial years, it was tough. Maybe we can add a line here how Manish as finance expert bailed the situation with his expertise & experience. The second most time-consuming thing was the number of Tax Litigations and Compliances, right from Transfer Pricing, Sales Tax to Service Tax, and more. It greys your hair much faster. At HSC, we started on a very strong note and for the first three years, we had exhilarating growth but then the 2008 meltdown happened, and we lost quite a few customers. It took us 3 - 4 years to get back on the growth path, sustaining the company in that period was extremely challenging but once we got out of it, there has been consistent growth and good cash generation.
Despite these challenges, because of the kind of values that we foster at HSC, we never had to cut any corners, for example, if there were ramp downs, we did not lay off any employee, we all worked as a team to get over the crisis. Also, I have a very good team with me which just
made it a lot easier.
In your professional journey so far, which are the milestones that bestowed you with utmost satisfaction both as an individual and as an industry leader?
Honestly, it's been a long stint, so to pick a few milestones is hard. None the less, I will try to pick some. First, when HSS got publicly listed, HSS was the first company that got listed through the Book Building. In the initial phase of my association with HSC, there was litigation concerning transfer pricing where the Tax authorities had raised an obnoxious amount of demands. Since we had a very strong case and had ensured that our compliance & documentation were quite robust, we were able to win most of the Transfer pricing cases in favor of HSC. To me, that was very satisfying as a professional.
Currency management has been extremely challenging due to the volatility in the FxMarket. At HSC, we have a very efficient and well-defined hedging policy which has ensured that nearly for a decade we have always had currency gains. I am proud that our treasury function has always added to the bottom line of HSC, Lastly, at HSC in the initial years, we were burning cash, but to my immense satisfaction, we have been now consistently generating cash from operations.
Reflect on the changing roles of CFOs and how technology is intervening in finance operations?
To me, the role of the CFO has changed significantly over the years. There was a time when the Finance function was considered to provide data on request but now the data is available to Key management personnel with on click of a button. Having a balanced scorecard, dashboard, key financial metrics to communicate the performance of the Company is critical for an organization. Easy availability of data helps in quick decision making and manoeuvring the resources in the desired direction.
Every key decision in an organization has a financial implication. making sure the management has a clear understanding and implication of the decision is a key role that a CFO plays. Technology has played a great part in ensuring the smooth and efficient functioning of the Finance operations. We have a fully automated reporting process, which includes monthly close, revenue analysis, margin analysis, utilization, and other key metrics. In fact, even much prior to covid we had moved to the digitization of all our vouchers and thus we could adapt easily to the work from home model.
Manish Kapoor, CFO, Hughes Systique Corporation
Manish completed his Chartered Accountancy after graduating from Sri Ram College of Commerce. Manish has joined Hughes Software System(HSS)in 1997 and in 2005 he joined Hughes Systique in the leadership team and he has been associated with Hughes for more than two decades. Prior to joining HSS, he had worked with Escorts group.
In your professional journey so far, which are the milestones that bestowed you with utmost satisfaction both as an individual and as an industry leader?
Honestly, it's been a long stint, so to pick a few milestones is hard. None the less, I will try to pick some. First, when HSS got publicly listed, HSS was the first company that got listed through the Book Building. In the initial phase of my association with HSC, there was litigation concerning transfer pricing where the Tax authorities had raised an obnoxious amount of demands. Since we had a very strong case and had ensured that our compliance & documentation were quite robust, we were able to win most of the Transfer pricing cases in favor of HSC. To me, that was very satisfying as a professional.
Currency management has been extremely challenging due to the volatility in the FxMarket. At HSC, we have a very efficient and well-defined hedging policy which has ensured that nearly for a decade we have always had currency gains. I am proud that our treasury function has always added to the bottom line of HSC, Lastly, at HSC in the initial years, we were burning cash, but to my immense satisfaction, we have been now consistently generating cash from operations.
Reflect on the changing roles of CFOs and how technology is intervening in finance operations?
To me, the role of the CFO has changed significantly over the years. There was a time when the Finance function was considered to provide data on request but now the data is available to Key management personnel with on click of a button. Having a balanced scorecard, dashboard, key financial metrics to communicate the performance of the Company is critical for an organization. Easy availability of data helps in quick decision making and manoeuvring the resources in the desired direction.
Every key decision in an organization has a financial implication. making sure the management has a clear understanding and implication of the decision is a key role that a CFO plays. Technology has played a great part in ensuring the smooth and efficient functioning of the Finance operations. We have a fully automated reporting process, which includes monthly close, revenue analysis, margin analysis, utilization, and other key metrics. In fact, even much prior to covid we had moved to the digitization of all our vouchers and thus we could adapt easily to the work from home model.
Manish Kapoor, CFO, Hughes Systique Corporation
Manish completed his Chartered Accountancy after graduating from Sri Ram College of Commerce. Manish has joined Hughes Software System(HSS)in 1997 and in 2005 he joined Hughes Systique in the leadership team and he has been associated with Hughes for more than two decades. Prior to joining HSS, he had worked with Escorts group.