Valuation Pushback: Holding the Research Line with a Founder

Manish built a public comparables valuation model for a founder at Marquee Equity, pulling EV/EBITDA and EV/revenue multiples from listed peers to arrive at a market-defensible valuation range. When he presented the findings, the founder pushed back.

The founder had engaged a registered valuer roughly a year and a half earlier, who had provided a higher valuation figure. The founder's position was that the business had grown materially since then, and the registered valuer's number should have moved up accordingly.

Manish held the research position while acknowledging the founder's perspective. He explained that registered valuers typically validate the projections a founder provides rather than independently stress-testing them, which is why those valuations often diverge from what the market will actually support. The number he had arrived at was not a judgment on the business quality; it was a reflection of how institutional investors would approach the conversation.

He also reframed the valuation as a reference point rather than a ceiling. He made clear that a strong business with solid fundamentals could command a premium, and that the comps-based number was a starting point for the conversation, not the final word. The discussion ended constructively, with the founder understanding the distinction between a registered valuation and a market-defensible one.