Meet Stephanie “The Suit” Sims

Stephanie has more than two decades of experience in finance, quality & IT management, and valuation of public and private entities.

She began her career in real estate investment banking, working with Goldman Sachs, CSFB and Lehman Brothers on over US$5B (book value) of transactions in the US and Europe. During her tenure, Ms. Sims was responsible for all aspects of transactions, from due diligence through closing.

Beginning in 1999, Stephanie assisted Swiss start-up MicroChemical Systems (MiCS) in obtaining multiple rounds of business development capital, and created financial projections and reporting processes sufficiently robust to satisfy venture capital investors. Over the next nine years, she managed the company’s finances, including the development of IFRS reporting, and created reliable data and improved communication through implementation of an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system. Stephanie was instrumental in the successful sale of MiCS to a FTSE-250 company in 2007, thanks to her extensive transaction experience.

Upon returning to the US in 2009, Ms. Sims founded Rimalu Ventures, a Scottsdale, Arizona-based consulting firm for small businesses. She has assisted clients in developing or strengthening their financial tools, which has allowed them to obtain additional financing from current or new investors. Her transaction, quality management, and strategic experience have also improved the value that clients have obtained from the sales of their business.

Here's Stephanie "The Business Owner" Sims

A second-generation entrepreneur, Stephanie believes that business owners are amazing people who contribute to both the local (financial) economy and the “mental” economy by generating hope and positive energy all around them. Too many business owners become disillusioned because they’re unable to fulfill their dreams, and the desire to help is what drove Stephanie to work within and later consult with start-ups in need of funding.

Her experience with large transactions and her knowledge of how due diligence works made it easy to spot one of the key reasons that entrepreneurs face such difficulty getting financing: they don’t understand the fundamentals of evaluating risks versus rewards.

This “aha” moment was driven home when her parents planned to sell the business they had owned for more than 25 years. Stephanie wanted them to recover something more than pride, so she started asking herself how she could help business owners realize their own value AND get enough knowledge about finance to stop being intimidated by “the suits”.

Working with owners during both the funding and sale process, she realized that business owners needed down-to-earth explanations of financial principles instead of jargon. And given the plethora of financing options, they needed an easy way to know where to start, so that they didn’t waste time and energy.

Developing this knowledge base led her to see that everyone has the ability to manage their finances successfully, but they don’t always realize it. And that’s where the notion of Finance-Ability was born…