Working Student · Corporate Strategy · Viega
A year on the buy side of a family-owned group — from the M&A long list to an investment the Group Board approved.
What I did
I brought the existing long list up to date: dropped targets that no longer fit, added new ones, removed those acquired in the meantime. Result: 85 targets across North America, Europe, Australia, and Asia Pacific & Middle East.
I rebuilt the Excel file around it — automations, dashboards, VBA, and the filter and scoring logic that turns the long list into a shortlist. It was then rolled out from the global team to corporate strategy in the regions.
I built the foundation of the model behind a >€50M energy investment the Group Board approved: a project DCF with no terminal value (finite asset life), a project-specific WACC, IRR and MOIC as decision metrics, and several cases for different project decisions, each with its own sensitivity matrices.
Case A
Case B
Case C
Two drivers moved against each other around the base case — prices against WACC here, further pairs for revenue and residual value — with IRR, NPV and MOIC read off every cell.