On September 21 and 22, more than 150 CFOs and financial executives from Slovakia and the Czech Republic will come together in Bratislava for the CFO Forum Slovakia by EBCG. Speakers and attendees will have the opportunity to discuss their ideas and analyses of innovation and the macroeconomic situation in the CEE region. One of our exceptional speakers will be Fabrice Dumontheil, CFO at Penta Investments.

What are your expectations from CFO Forum Slovakia?

Meeting your peers is very important to me. I am joining CFO Forum Slovakia to find people to discuss ideas and share innovation and best practices.

What are the most valuable lessons you learned so far during your career?

Always keep it simple! Many people and organizations tend to make things more complicated than they should be. The main job of a CFO is to keep processes and systems as simple and efficient as possible.

You know that this year we are focusing on innovation. How do you see innovation from your position of CFO?

For me, the biggest innovation these days is data analytics. Data analysis is changing the way we understand the granularity of our businesses and will help us unlock our company’s true potential.

During your presentation, you will talk about EBITDA and most of all about its limitations. Can you elaborate a little more on that?

EBITDA stands for earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization and is a common method that is used as the main driver for M&A valuations and management performance reviews. Most of the equity or debt transactions are using EBITDA multiples as a key parameter. For one thing, I will argue that over-reliance on EBITDA is too narrow. Owners, investors, and managers should expand their parameters and use other criteria as well.

For the Slovak version, click here.

Small Bio

Fabrice is the CFO of Penta Investments. He manages and supervises various departments across Penta which includes controlling & reporting, analysis, consolidation, treasury, investment risk, IT, tax, internal audit, and procurement. He is a member of Penta Investment Committee as well as the member of the Executive Board.

Fabrice has over 20 years of experience in senior financial management roles. He is an expert in liquidity management, cost-cutting and restructuring with a solid international exposure (United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Spain).