INSIGHTS

3 Critical Small-Cap Challenges Awaiting New Board Members That No One Talks About
By Small-Cap Institute.After having undertaken thorough diligence with respect to a prospective small-cap board opportunity, a common question for first-time board members...

When Your Company Has Bad Financial News… Don’t Do Any of These Things
By Small-Cap Institute Business performance is not linear and is often challenging to forecast. Every public company is going to have bad news periodically. It is a...

SPACs Have Revitalized a Misunderstood Small-Cap Financing Mechanism: PIPEs
By Small-Cap Institute According to research about the SPAC market by global law firm Freshfields, 69 percent of the consummated SPACS in 2020 were supported by PIPE...

A Differentiated, Practical Methodology for Analyzing Public Company Board Seat Opportunities (public)
By Small-Cap Institute[This is a truncated version of a more thorough piece for SCI members. If you are an officer/director of a public company, you can join here to view...

Table of Contents
An overview of Small-Cap Institute’s content library.

SCI Exclusives: Unique Small-Cap Boardroom Challenges with Fund Manager Joseph Manko
This is the third in a new series of live interviews (SCI Exclusives) undertaken by Small-Cap Institute’s (SCI) editorial advisory board member, Amanda Gerut, where SCI will...

Three Hard Truths About Email Most Executives Overlook
By Small-Cap Institute This was adapted from an advisory bulletin recently written by the chair of our editorial advisory board, Adam J. Epstein.Most disastrous boardroom...

SCI Exclusives: From Large-Caps to Startups with Tech Veteran Caroline Tsay
This is the second in a new series of live interviews (SCI Exclusives) undertaken by Small-Cap Institute’s (SCI) editorial advisory board member, Amanda Gerut, where SCI...

SCI Exclusives: A Candid Interview with Legendary Fund Manager John W. Rogers, Jr.
This is the first in a new series of live interviews (SCI Exclusives) undertaken by Small-Cap Institute’s Amanda Gerut, where SCI will be spending time together with...

Webinar: Better Investor Meetings with the Buy-side
Small-Cap Institute's founder, David Scher, was hosted by Paul Dorfman, Head of LIstings - NYSE American, for a webinar discussing some of the ways companies can improve...

It Might be Time for Small-Caps to Start Caring About ESG
Nasdaq data shows it could significantly impact your future ability to attract and retain investors.by Amanda GerutSo far, sustainability and environmental, social, and...

Investors’ Favorite Small-Cap Boardroom Hire
Unlike in most mid- and large-cap companies, it’s common for small-cap companies to be operated and governed by those who are either new to public company roles, or by those who lack significant experience operating and governing public companies.

Examples of Great Small-Cap Boards in Action
Spend enough time in boardrooms, and you will find that transformative governance often starts in innocuous ways. A shift in one board member’s body language may open the...

The Systemic Dilemma for Small-Cap Service Providers
A recent piece in The Wall Street Journal alluded to a fascinating insight: “Companies appear to avoid hiring auditors that have a history of critical audits at other...

CEO Corner with Karen Zaderej, Chairman, CEO, and President of Axogen Corporation
Small-Cap Institute's Amanda Gerut interviews Axogen Corporation's Karen Zaderej. Ms. Zaderej is chairman, CEO, and president of Axogen Corporation (NASDAQ:AXGN). Axogen...
CEO Corner with Garry Ridge, CEO of WD-40 Company
Small-Cap Institute's Amanda Gerut interviews WD-40 CEO, Garry Ridge. Mr. Ridge is president and chief executive officer of the WD-40 Company (NASDAQ:WDFC). WD-40 Company is...

SCI Insights: Candid, Off the Record Q&A with an Institutional Investor & Board Member
Public company boards, whether they are listed or not, are supposed to be selected predominantly by independent board members that make up the nominating/governance committee of a board. Sadly, in most small-cap companies, it’s the CEO who personally selects board members. Since board members are supposed to oversee the manner in which the CEO and others operate the company, it’s a glaring problem, as friends don’t typically do a great job objectively overseeing their friends.

SCI Book Highlights: The Imperfect Board Member – Discovering the Seven Disciplines of Governance Excellence
SCI Book Highlights The Imperfect Board Member Discovering the Seven Disciplines of Governance ExcellenceDescription [excerpted from the book]: Meet David Slater. He is an...
CEO Corner with Billy Prim, Founder of Blue Rhino and Primo Water
Small-Cap Institute's Amanda Gerut interviews renowned small-cap CEO, Billy Prim. Mr. Prim founded Blue Rhino, which was ultimately acquired for $340m. Subsequently, Mr....

An M&A Process That Creates Value: What Every CEO Should Know (Part 1 of 3 – Planning and Strategy)
Organic growth can be slow and hard to come by. In sectors that are periodically most affected by political uncertainty, trade disputes, and other geopolitical changes, customers can end up deferring their buying decisions, which makes new revenue elusive. In other instances, revenue expansion requires substantial investment in R&D that may not pay off for years. Sometimes, growth is constrained by the inability to attract needed talent or the absence of important intellectual property. With growth an imperative, some small-cap CEOs turn to mergers and acquisitions (M&A) as a solution.
SUBSCRIBER CONTENT
Board Compensation in Small-Cap Life Sciences Companies: The Elusive Data
Nearly 80 percent of public companies in the United States have market capitalizations[i] below $500 million. Despite the sheer number of small-cap[ii] companies, once you descend below $500 million market capitalization, reliable, constructive[iii], board...
Investor Relations: Hiring the Right Firm and Setting Expectations
Many small-cap companies view investor relations (IR) as a necessary evil, or simply a cost of being a public company. Consequently, they do a poor job of purchasing IR services, and cycle restlessly between different firms. But it doesn’t have to be this way, and...
There Are Good Reasons Why Most Small-Cap Buy-Backs Are Ignored… Or Worse
Small-cap companies undertake a variety of measures – often under pressure from shorter-term investors or misinformed service providers – aimed at increasing share price sooner versus later. One of them is stock buy-backs. But more often than not, officers and...
Memo to Small-Cap Boards: Don’t Outsource Your Proxy Filings to Lawyers
Considering that greater than 80 percent of shareholder activist campaigns each year are waged against small-cap companies, it is critical for small-caps to communicate clearly about the issues investors care most about. Notwithstanding the fact that annual proxy...
Non-Deal Roadshows: A Primer
by James CarbonaraWhat is an NDR (non-deal roadshow)A non-deal roadshow, or NDR, is a series of investor meetings not associated with an active deal or active financings. That said, if you raise money in the future, investors you meet with on an NDR are potentially...
There’s Only One Replicable Way to Select the Right Investment Bankers: Start with Data
Small-cap companies choose investment bankers for many reasons: “they showed a lot of interest in us.” “they really seem to ‘get’ what we do.” “they’ve done our last 4 financings.” “a banker who we’ve worked with in the past, just joined this bank.” “they always...
Selecting ATM Bankers
At-the-market offerings (ATMs) are unique financing mechanisms, because stock is sold intraday – without a fixed price – into the natural flow of trading. Unlike other financing mechanisms, ATMs provide issuers with a high degree of control over the timing, size, and...
Sell-Side Equity Research Coverage: Clarifying Persistent CEO Misconceptions
One of the least understood aspects of shepherding a small-cap company is garnering and maintaining sell-side equity research coverage. The goal of this piece is to clear up commonly-held misconceptions. Attracting coverage Economics. One of the main reasons why...
Few Small-Cap CEOs Understand This Math, And It Costs Them Millions
As Small-Cap Institute has discussed, there is widespread confusion among small-cap leaders on the subject of trading volume; i.e., where it actually comes from, where it doesn’t come from, and how to get more of it. One of the most insidious byproducts of this...
How Sell-Side Research Analysts Make Money: An Insider’s Primer for Small-Cap Officers and Directors
By Shawn SeversonSmall-cap officers and directors often understandably lack a thorough understanding of the “business” of sell-side equity research. Without an accurate rendering of the drivers and economics of the research business, it’s hard to have realistic...