If you want a marketplace that has taken 200 SaaS companies to Series A, that is not this page. I am one operator. The proof I will stand behind is two clients who closed on a SAFE or a first priced round, plus the PE seat after the uniform: Entech, two acquisitions, $9M; ARCOS, $158K procurement. Résumé bullets. I will not invent a fundraise war story to fill the white space.

Have you closed a SAFE or first priced round with a client?

Yes. Two. That is the number. If you need a shop that quotes “dozens of rounds,” keep walking. What those two required is the same thing a priced round always requires, whether the check is a SAFE or a Series seed: books that tie, a model that is not a plug, and a person in the finance seat who will not lie to the room about cash.

What does “diligence-ready” actually mean?

It does not mean a data room full of PDFs. It means the file survives a skeptical reader.

• Books that tie. Bank to GL. Revenue to contracts or invoices. Headcount to payroll. If the CPA’s close is late, we fix the close with them — we do not replace them.
• A model an investor can interrogate. Drivers, not a hockey stick. Scenarios. Cash, not just ARR theater. I have built and broken models in a PE-backed seat. I will not ship a template I downloaded.
• Cap table that matches the docs. SAFEs convert on terms people forget they signed. The model and the legal file have to say the same thing. Your lawyer owns the docs. I own the implication for ownership and cash.
• A 13-week cash view through the close, not a “we’ll be fine once the wire hits.” Wires slip. Payroll does not.
• The Q&A. I sit in the finance questions. I do not do the pitch. You do the pitch.

What changes between a SAFE and a first priced round?

The legal instrument changes. The books should not. A SAFE is faster and sloppier on paper, which is why founders treat the finance file as optional. That is how you close a SAFE and then fail the first priced round because nobody can reconstruct revenue. A priced round puts a valuation and a preferred stack on the table. Diligence gets longer. The file has to already exist.

	SAFE / convertible	First priced round
What the investor is buying	A future piece of the company, on a cap or discount, often before a clean valuation.	Preferred stock at a price. Governance. A cap table that just got real.
What the books must do	Tie. Show cash runway. Show that revenue is not a demo. Track the SAFE so the next round is not a surprise.	Everything on the left, plus a diligence trail: cohort or contract support, burn, hiring plan, use of proceeds.
Cap table	Easy to ignore. Expensive later. Model the conversion before you sign another one.	The round is the cap table. Mismatch with legal docs kills trust in the first week.
Cadence	Can close on a 10-hour seat if the file is already honest.	Live diligence can exceed a retainer. Then it is a project, or it is a full-time search. I will say which.
What I will not do	Invent traction. Broker the round. Be your lawyer.	Invent traction. Broker the round. Be your lawyer. Sit on every diligence call if the calendar is daily — that is when full-time wins.

Who is this for — and who it is not?

Founder-led tech, including the $3–25M operator that is raising, not just the pre-revenue shop. PE-backed companies that need the file clean for a recap or a next close — that is closer to the Entech / ARCOS work than to a YC template. US Central and Eastern. Cape Coral HQ.

Not for: a seed-SaaS factory that wants a marketplace CFO on a Slack. Not for “get us to Series A” as a product. Not for founders who need someone to invent a metric. If the honest answer is “do not raise yet, fix the books,” that is the call. Bookkeeping stays with your CPA. Your counsel stays your counsel.

What proof sits behind the PE line?

After the uniform: CFO at Entech, a PE-backed MSP — two acquisitions, $9M of growth in the first year, contract structure restaged. Director of Finance & Business Analytics at ARCOS (Vista Equity-backed SaaS) — $158K first-year procurement savings, a data lake, the finance seat on commercial questions. Those are the bullets on the site. I will not add a scene I did not live.

Before that: E-1 to squadron commander. 341st Comptroller Squadron, $720M, 140 people, command June 2020. Nuclear-wing CFO. The raise does not care about the missile field. The raise cares whether you can run a file under pressure. That part transfers.

What does it cost?

Same offer as the rest of the practice. No hidden “founder special.”

• 10 hours / $5,000 a month — $60,000 a year. File hygiene, model, monthly operating review, SAFE tracking.
• 20 hours / $7,500 a month — $90,000 a year. A live process that is not yet daily diligence.
• Project. Diligence file, model rebuild, sell-side cleanup. Quoted after a 30-minute call. I do not publish fake packages for a round I have not seen.

If diligence is daily for months, full-time (or a dedicated project) wins. I wrote that on the vs full-time page and I mean it here. Pricing — what’s in / what’s not.

Questions I get

Have you closed a SAFE or first priced round with a client?

Yes. I have sat in the finance seat for companies raising on SAFEs and first priced rounds. Two of those clients have closed. I will not invent a longer track record than that.

What does diligence-ready actually mean?

Books that tie. A model an investor can interrogate without finding a plug. A cap table that matches the legal docs. Revenue that is not a hope. Cash that matches the bank. I do not replace your CPA, your lawyer, or your banker.

Is this a Series A SaaS fractional CFO shop?

No. I do not run a seed-SaaS factory and I do not compete with marketplace firms that productize Series A. This is the operator seat for a founder-led or PE-backed company that needs the file clean for a SAFE or a first priced round — or for a $3–25M shop that happens to be raising.

What does it cost?

10 hours / $5,000 or 20 hours / $7,500 a month. Project work around a live raise is quoted after a 30-minute call. I do not publish fake packages for a round I have not seen.

If the round assumes the file is clean, look at the file first.

Book 30 min. Bring the cap table and last month’s close. We will know if this is a retainer, a project, or “do not raise yet.”

Book 30 min or call (616) 881-6777

Gabriel Denny — E-1 to squadron commander, nuclear-wing CFO, PE-backed operator.

Gabriel Denny Financial Services, LLC · 1718 NW 14th Terrace, Cape Coral, FL 33993 · (616) 881-6777 · gabe@gabrieldenny.com