Price the unfinished work before celebrating the fee

In 2019 I accepted an animation project’s ₹1.8 crore expected cost against a ₹2.4 crore fee without making the remaining-work estimate sufficiently explicit. We had already incurred ₹1.1 crore. Production’s revised account required a further ₹1.2 crore, bringing expected cost to ₹2.3 crore and leaving ₹10 lakh before central costs, rather than the ₹60 lakh previously shown. Iqbal challenged the assumption behind my paper. I had allowed the apparent margin to survive because the work still ahead of us was described less precisely than the spending already recorded.

I now lead finance at Vezqalni Animation Works in Bhubaneswar. The 310-person company recorded ₹134 crore FY2025–26 revenue across commissioned animation and finishing services. Twenty-eight finance colleagues work through four heads within ₹4.8 crore annual function expense and a separate ₹1.6 crore systems programme. I report to Nandita, our CEO, and present to directors without holding a statutory seat. I own no personal equity. Production, accounting and contractual decisions retain their qualified owners; my responsibility is to make the financial consequence available before the enterprise commits.

Later reviews concerned customer advances inside a cash balance and an outsourcing proposal whose internal comparison included costs that would remain. In the first, ₹12 crore of an ₹18 crore balance related to commissioned work with ₹9 crore forecast delivery outflow. In the second, a ₹1.6 crore external quote could not be described as a saving against ₹1.4 crore internal cost when ₹1 crore would continue after outsourcing. These are management decision accounts, not revenue-recognition or legal opinions. My next contribution should help a company distinguish the attractive number from the obligation it must still carry. An outside appointment would require further governance preparation, specific assessment and a workable twenty-three-day annual proposal.

Current focus

Project finance that keeps remaining production obligations visible

Conversations I welcome

Finance leadership and a prepared first outside-board contribution