SDi Fire Unlocks Working Capital and Increases Profit Margins With Resolve

SDi Fire was founded 1996 with the mission of providing security and fire alarm testing equipment to corporations all around the world. Initially, SDi Fire only provided a small range of detector testing tools. SDi Fire has since grown from its humble beginnings and now offers a wide array of industrial grade fire alarm testing products from top manufacturers all around the world. SDi Fire continues to maintain relationships with leading industry associations and committees to ensure that they continue to be knowledgeable and well-versed in the latest fire protection and safety standards. Notable clients of SDi Fire include NASA, Disney and Seaworld. Their devices can even be found in Buckingham Palace.

 

SDi Fire had been offering terms to their B2B customers, but as their business grew, the process began to strain their operations since capital was being tied up in accounts receivable. In addition, it was time-consuming and difficult to determine the creditworthiness of new accounts. If SDi Fire stopped extending terms, this would result in lost sales and lower margins, since their customers would purchase from their distributors instead. As a result, SDi Fire searched for a B2B financing partner that would allow their customers to continue buying directly. Their top requirements for a net payment terms partner included:

• Free up working capital
  One of the important selection criteria for SDi Fire was the ability to free up their working capital. SDi Fire understood that by having more working capital they could invest this capital into the company's overall growth.
   
• Fast and simple
  The life safety industry is considered to be slowing moving and resistant to change. Just getting customers to switch from faxing orders to emails could be an endeavor. As a result, the ability to apply for terms had to be extremely fast and simple for their customers.
   
• Dedicated support
  SDi Fire wanted a partner that had a "small company feel" so they could reach out and talk to a real person if they ran into any issues. They didn't want to be another "number", which is what they felt when talking to traditional banks. In addition, SDi Fire wanted to integrate their terms process with their ERP system, so they wanted a close partner who could also support them on the technical side to ensure that this process went smoothly.

SDi Fire had a clear selection criterion when they were searching for a partner that could help solve their B2B net payments problems. It was very important to SDi Fire that the credit application process was super easy to navigate and understand. They didn't want a situation where the application process ended up becoming a blocker to their customers. In Resolve, SDi Fire was able to find a solution that was very simple for both SDi Fire and for SDi Fire's customers. In fact, it was so easy that their customers didn't initially believe SDI Fire when they explained the application process. SDi Fire evaluated other competitors in the B2B financing space. But none of these other offerings gave SDi Fire the level of comfort that they needed in order to proceed and sign on with these solution providers. Resolve was able to solve SDi Fire's B2B terms problems while maintaining a very personal relationship. SDi Fire wanted to know that their needs were important and that they could have a direct line of communication with their service provider and Resolve was able to provide that level of personal support to them.

 

Since partnering with Resolve, SDi Fire has seen a marked improvement on their profit margins. SDi Fire's profit margins have increased by 25% in comparison to prior partnering with Resolve. Historically, their customers would have purchased from a distributor so that they could pay on net payment terms. This would have resulted in lower margins. Now SDi Fire is able to work directly with these customers. As a result, SDi Fire has able to build and grow direct relationships with their customers. Resolve has taken away any guesswork required when providing credit to SDi Fire's customers. In the past, SDi Fire would have to run their own credit checks on a one-to-one basis. It was very difficult for SDi Fire to understand their customers' creditworthiness. The process of evaluating a potential customer's creditworthiness was long (sometimes taking weeks) SDi Fire's potential customers sometimes struggled to provide trade references which was a key piece to understanding creditworthiness. In these situations, SDi Fire had to make a educated guesses when deciding whether to extend credit. SDi Fire no longer has to go through a long vetting process with each customer, as they could leverage Resolve's ability to take care of all the credit offering decisions and they can focus on growing their business. This has significantly shortened the amount of time they require to make credit decisions, from weeks down to hours. SDi Fire's customers are delighted that the credit application is seamless as the credit product is still billed as SDi Fire, but now it's powered by Resolve. From this perspective, SDi Fire's customers feel a level of security since they are still purchasing directly from SDi Fire. Their customers love the ability to apply for net terms on SDi Fire's website and get a response back relatively quickly. Resolve has been able hit on all the metrics that SDi Fire cares about: increase in profit margins, process simplification, and increase in conversions.