Sunflower Nutraceuticals Summary

Growth and Value Creation at Sunflower Nutraceuticals
Sunflower Nutraceuticals (SNC) is a nutraceuticals distributor based in Miami, Florida. Prior to 2012, SNC had flat annual sales growth with total revenues of $10 million and had been experiencing financing issues due to its thin margins and high working capital intensity. Miami Dade Merchant’s Bank (MDM) was SNC’s previous financier, but refused to increase SNC’s line of credit of $3.2 million, which was limiting SNC’s ability to grow because of the working capital constraints. In 2012, SNC decided to accept an alternative financing option from Averell & Tuttle (AT), an investment bank. AT provided SNC with a line of credit of $3.7 million at a 10% interest rate for a 10% equity stake.

When analyzing the high risk customer, a base case with the standard WACC of 12% and a worse case with a WACC of 14% were utilized. Although the NPV of the best case was $260,000, the NPV of the worst case was negative $9,000. Due to SNC’s goals of continued growth and efficient utilization of funds, the worst case was used to make the final decision because of the uncertainty regarding this project. The prior two phases had shown a steady increase in ROE and ROA, so SNC’s executives chose to accept all projects that were certain to produce a positive NPV without overdrawing their line of credit. By adopting a global expansion strategy, SNC was able continue to grow its revenues without tying too much cash up in inventory. Although, the FCF at the beginning of this phase was negative, it was made up over the remainder of phase 3. This phase resulted in an additional value creation of $715,000, but also resulted in a cash surplus of $740,000 at the end of 2021. This may be seen as a failure to invest by some investors, but it also provides SNC with extra cash to pay its liabilities or invest more in a future project. SNC could also use its additional funds to pay a dividend to its shareholders, which has not previously been done before. The introduction of a dividend could help appease investors who are

This has placed SNC in a position to take on more leverage in the future, especially with its continuously growing interest coverage ratio. At the end of phase 3, SNC has a high interest coverage ratio of 105.88 due to the low level of interest expense, which steadily decreased from phase 1 to phase 3 . The improvement in interest coverage over the three phases shows investors that SNC is a creditable investment and shows SNC that they can take on more debt if needed. SNC is satisfied with its decision to switch to AT as its financier over MDM because of the long run potential benefits. Although SNC did not over draw its credit line or utilize the additional $500,000 on their credit line over the nine years, they have generated a cash surplus and enough value to meet their debt needs, as well as built a more stable and profitable company. By giving up the 10% equity to AT, SNC will be able to take on more projects in the years to come and continue to grow. They also will have a financier who supports them and can also benefit as they