Paul Sheppard

Paul Sheppard Email and Phone Number

Chief Financial Officer at Amplify @ Amplify
Paul Sheppard's Location
New York, New York, United States, United States
About Paul Sheppard

Expert at identifying, growing and realizing value in private companies. Growth-orientated & strategic CFO & board member with operational, private equity investor, public company and M&A experience. Love to work with entrepreneurs to build businesses. Strong leader, team builder and great partner to founders, CEOs, executive teams and PE or VC investors/boards.Track record of creating and realizing value. Five successful exits: Entangled (CFO/COO), Whiteboard (CFO), Practice XYZ (CFO), AMS (Board & CFO) & Agrileum (Investor/Board) Deep and broad experience in SaaS, information services, education & corporate training and 2-sided marketplace businesses. Excel at using data and analysis to drive a business forward. Adaptable leader who consistently drives profitable revenue growth. Manage with a private investor's mindset, coupled with hands-on deep and broad operational experience across strategy, operations, finance, accounting, legal, HR, BD, sales and customer-facing functions. Been an investor and fiduciary, investing in businesses before taking financial & operational roles in them. Proven track record of raising capital in multiple forms at different stages, building teams and businesses, doing value-creating M&A, making investments and realizing exits. Adept at building processes to scale rapidly, focusing on the handful of KPIs that matter and implementing systems to embed real-time data driven decision making across businesses. Popular leader and experienced manager, who has both built teams and led them to collaborate cross functionally to execute company-wide goals successfully. Strong work ethic and highly commercial. Good member of high performing teams. Recent career highlights include scaling Amplify from ~$200M to >$600M in 3 years, building a $150mm+ revenue business from scratch, scaling Entangled to achieve a $100mm+ exit in 3 years, selling two others for 3-5x returns and working at an Apollo portfolio company that filed an S-1 to go public. Have also learned from business setbacks, and built resilience.Blue chip M&A/capital raising/exit career foundation, having worked on 25+ completed deals, valued at over $100bn+ in aggregate. Started career at leading boutique M&A investment banks in London and New York. Notable transaction experience include two successful IPOs, minority equity stake sale of Gerson Lehrman to Silver Lake, multiple debt financings and trade sales. Fulbright Scholar, Wharton MBA (graduated in top 20% of class) and Cambridge University undergraduate. Live in NYC with family. Dual US/UK citizen.

Paul Sheppard's Current Company Details
Amplify

Amplify

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Chief Financial Officer at Amplify
Paul Sheppard Work Experience Details
  • Amplify
    Chief Financial Officer & Head Of Corporate Development
    Amplify Sep 2020 - Present
    Brooklyn, Ny, Us
  • Entangled Group (Now Guild Education)
    Chief Financial Officer
    Entangled Group (Now Guild Education) May 2017 - May 2020
    San Francisco, California, Us
    Entangled was a venture studio focused on fostering innovation in education with a consulting business serving colleges, foundations and companies that we leveraged to found and grow innovative product-based edtech businesses. We raised over $50mm in convertible debt, SAFE, Series Seed, A and B rounds. In the 3 years, we grew sales ~10x and headcount ~8x by building seven portfolio companies: Entangled Solutions (sold to Guild), OutSet Careers (sold to Guild), Practice XYZ (sold to Instructure), ReUp Education (Series A), PathStream (Series A), Adjacent Academies (Series Seed) and Embark. We spun off Whiteboard Advisors and provided CFO support. We acquired ProjectEd from Amplify & Koru's assets. We held angel stakes and sat on boards of leading ed-tech companies, including Guild, Andela, Yellowbrick, FlyWire and RaiseMe. I was the CFO and Board participant for Entangled’s Holdco and its portfolio companies. My role encompassed finance, accounting, forecasting/business planning, fundraising, treasury, tax, investor relations, Board management, M&A, legal, HR, operations, strategy and sales administration.
  • Invoke
    Board Member
    Invoke Jan 2017 - Oct 2017
    Waltham, Ma, Us
    Invoke merged with AMS, a SaaS-based education business that was sold to CampusLabs, a Leeds Equity portfolio company. I was initially involved with AMS during my time at ConnectEDU. I was appointed to the Board of Invoke by North Atlantic Capital (NAC), a growth capital investor in SaaS companies, and was instrumental in helping sell AMS in September 2017, generating a 2x+ return. I was a Member of the Audit and Compensation Committees.
  • Mcgraw Hill
    Chief Operating Officer, Learning Science Platforms & Vice President, Strategy
    Mcgraw Hill Sep 2014 - Jan 2017
    New York, Ny, Us
    Recruited by the Group CEO of a ~$2bn revenue, private equity backed education company preparing for an IPO and undergoing a transition in its core business model to digital SaaS platforms. Led CEO’s research project on the future of the education. Developed the plan for a new business unit to license McGraw-Hill’s proprietary adaptive software platform to improve corporate training. Promoted to an operating role to partner with a proven entrepreneur to implement the business plan. Built team and installed operating processes to rapidly scale the business. Developed standardized sales presentation, product demo & sales rep training. Trained existing salesforce, introduced sales incentives, developed standard customer contracts and optimized pricing. Built and oversaw marketing function. Managed budget. Additionally, worked for the Group CFO to prepare for an annual Board strategy meeting.
  • Invoke (Formerly Academic Management Systems) - Successful Exit Via Trade Sale
    Chief Financial Officer
    Invoke (Formerly Academic Management Systems) - Successful Exit Via Trade Sale May 2014 - Oct 2014
    Appointed by Board member of ConnectEDU who became the majority owner of AMS to be the lead executive at a SaaS education technology company. Provided leadership to ~10 employees through highly challenging circumstances with no attrition. Led strategic planning to grow business and migrate software to a new platform. Set-up and managed finance & accounting, human resources and legal functions. Implemented controls. Appointed auditors.AMS was owned by North Atlantic Capital that merged it with its existing portfolio company, Invoke.
  • Connectedu
    Chief Financial Officer
    Connectedu Jan 2014 - Apr 2014
    Boston, Ma, Us
    Recruited by ConnectEdu’s lead investor to evaluate the company’s options in a turnarond situation. Reported to the Board & CEO. Provided comprehensive assessment of ConnectEdu’s cashflow, pipeline and business model. Worked in close partnership with CEO to devise an alternative strategy to present to investors. Worked with investment bank to sell AMS, a ConnectEdu subsidiary (that went on to become Invoke). Provided company-wide executive leadership to ~80 employees. Recruited Controller. Cut operating expenses by 20% and improved working capital management. Oversaw Accounting, Finance, FP&A, Human Resources and Legal functions. Ultimately, ConnectEdu was restructured and sold to an investment company.
  • Lotus Capital
    Private Equity Investment Partner And Operating Cfo
    Lotus Capital Sep 2009 - Sep 2013
    Old Greenwich, Connecticut, Us
    Junior partner at an operationally-focused private equity firm. Devised strategy, raised financing for and built two successful businesses. Food processing business that generates $150mm+ annual revenues. Renewable energy business generates $25mm+ annual revenues. Raised and directly invested $30mm+ in the two businesses. Negotiated 15 debt/equity investment rounds, totaling $140mm+ of capital. Interim CFO/operating executive and hands-on board member. Significantly improved FP&A/budgeting to raise further financing. Negotiated $1bn 5-year sales off-take contract to facilitate fund-raising. Found practical solution to protracted legal case to facilitate fund-raising. Hired/fired CEO & CFOs to improve businesses performance.
  • Evercore
    Vice President, Investment Banking
    Evercore Feb 2007 - Jun 2009
    New York, Ny, Us
    Ten completed deals, collectively valued at over $90 billion. Advised CEOs, CFOs, Boards and management teams on major financial, strategic and M&A decisions. Completed mandates included sell-sides, buy-sides, mergers, private placements, PIPEs, defenses, fairness opinions for Special Committees and IPO advisory services. Worked across a range of sectors, including education, information services, media, energy, financial technology, internet, IT outsourcing and healthcare.
  • Pearson
    Vice President, Corporate Development And Strategy
    Pearson May 2004 - Jan 2007
    London, Gb
    Focused on education, worked on eight completed buy-side investments and two sell-side deals, ranging from ~$10 million to $1 billion. Worked as #2 in a highly-influential team supporting the Group CEO on all major transactions, strategic projects, board presentations and competitive analyses. The role involved working with Pearson’s senior management team. Wrote investment papers, led valuation analyses, coordinated due diligence, developed strategic rationales, completed valuations and worked on the negotiation, execution and ongoing monitoring of Pearson’s US M&A activities. Recruited to Evercore to work on major education initiative.
  • Apax Partners Llp
    Private Equity Internship | Summer Associate
    Apax Partners Llp May 2002 - Aug 2002
    Gb
    MBA private equity internship at Apax Partners in London, focused on evaluating media and retail sectors. Skills gained included LBO modeling, due diligence, management evaluation, market research and deal generation. Gained the perspective of a leading LBO and venture capital investor.
  • Financial Times
    Internship | Lex Writer
    Financial Times Feb 2001 - Jun 2001
    London, England, Gb
    As a pre-MBA internship, wrote daily editorials for Europe’s leading investment column covering company, macro-economic and political news. Skills gained included researching investment ideas, writing concisely and developing the courage to take a stand on an idea. Gained the perspective of leading public market investors.
  • Citi
    Analyst/Associate
    Citi Dec 1997 - Feb 2001
    New York, New York, Us
    Classic rigorous Analyst/Associate training and experience at top tier London merchant bank, with a quarter of the FTSE 100 as clients. Eight completed deals, collectively valued at over $25bn, including 2 successful IPOs. Learned core financial/capital markets/accounting skills, analytical rigor and relationship development. Schroders was acquired by Citigroup in 2000.
  • House Of Commons
    Economic Researcher For Geoffrey Robinson Mp
    House Of Commons Oct 1995 - Dec 1997
    London, Gb
    Economic researcher helping a Treasury team prepare for government. Mr. Robinson was a successful entrepreneur, former CEO of Jaguar Cars, director of Coventry City FC, owner of the New Statesman and became Paymaster General. As part of my role, I personally briefed two future Prime Ministers (Tony Blair and Gordon Brown), worked on the successful 1997 General Election and preceding by-election campaigns and witnessed at first hand the power of great leadership to transform an organization and a country for the better. I had hands on experience of implementing winning marketing strategies.

Paul Sheppard Education Details

  • The Wharton School
    The Wharton School
    Finance
  • University Of Cambridge
    University Of Cambridge
    Economics And History

Frequently Asked Questions about Paul Sheppard

What company does Paul Sheppard work for?

Paul Sheppard works for Amplify

What is Paul Sheppard's role at the current company?

Paul Sheppard's current role is Chief Financial Officer at Amplify.

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What is Paul Sheppard's direct phone number?

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What schools did Paul Sheppard attend?

Paul Sheppard attended The Wharton School, University Of Cambridge.

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