Upgrade your business strategy & business plan

Upgrade from any prior version of business plan software. Questions? Feel free to call us: 1-800-346-5426

20+ years of experience, development and practical use make this upgrade the best ever!

We've done a tremendous amount of development work since you've last seen Biz Plan Builder. Not only have we upgraded all of the text, we have dramatically improved the financial model spreadsheets with more calculators and a bunch of graphs. Our experts and I have been regularly attending investor meetings and listening to what angel and venture capital investors, as well as SBA lenders, want from entrepreneurs and business owners today. They haven't changed much, but they want more. We also read a tremendous number of journals, receive a wide variety of e-zines, and constantly access many web sites and blogs looking for better ways to make Biz Plan Builder better for you. Also, customers are always contacting us with questions, upgrade ideas and success stories. The nice thing about software is that we can build it all in and let the system help you sort and select what you want.

Wow! This is a huge difference compared to the version I bought back in the mid 90s.
Nice work.
- Mark Gascon, health-mart.com

Technology has come a long way too
The Windows application program that drives the Biz Plan Builder system has been completely overhauled as a result. (We're working on the Mac application!) One of the single biggest upgrades is the ability to access your business plan files from multiple computers — whether you want to work from your office, home or laptop, and/or engage others to work with you — Now you can! Also, we've learned a lot ourselves from running a successful and profitable business over the past 20 years.

As an expert financial consultant,
I was amazed at the depth of the package and its ease of use.
~ Tom Devine, The Clayton Group, New York

Upgrade enables true business plan collaboration
This upgrade of Biz Plan Builder business planning software is a true multi-user program enabling you to share files with others — your management team, consultants, investors — with complete access control and security. (Unlike other, old-school business plan software systems that make you email files, then cut and paste back into your plan.) Now you can share your files over a network, server or the Internet.

The user interface is slick and improved.
The biggest improvements that I can see are the new content and the sharing mode.
- David Handel, Beaux Arts du Soleil, Absecon, NJ

Upgrades in Biz Plan Builder 2010 (Version 11)

(Since v9)(Windows only for now...)

• New! Automatic Updates from v10
  
  • Easily paste in sections from previous plan templates
• New! Now it's Multi-User Capable — Anytime/Anywhere Access to Files Enables Collaboration
• Work from your office PC, home PC or laptop to easily access your files from a server or shared storage device. Designate an unlimited number of additional users to collaborate with you using password-protected access. (They need to have their own licensed copy of Biz Plan Builder.)
  
  • This is true multi-user file-sharing for collaboration — much more than email transferring of files. Add an unlimited number of users!
  • Management Teams – Share the work and get your plan done.
  • Consultants – Create plans and keep connected with your clients.
  • Educators – Oversee and participate with your student teams.
  • Investment Bankers – Quickly make changes and update plans
• New! Collaborate Over the Internet
  
  • If you have storage online, you can share files securely over the web. When you want it, you can sign up with our online storage partner for anytime/anywhere access to your documents.
  • Control other users' access: None/Read-Only/Edit.
    
    • Section by section Check-Out & Check-In.
• New! Live updates from the JIAN web site keep you up-to-date.
• New! Powerful document assembly system lets you add your own documents and easily incorporate them into your business plan.
  
  • Include your previous business plan documents.
  • Click browse to add any document in your system.
  • Drag & drop sorting lets you organize your plan your way.
  • Build your own custom documents using this powerful document assembly system.
• We’ve upgraded every document in the system.
  
  • Edited from the inside out to appeal to current investors & lenders
  • Expert Comments throughout add insights and explanations
• New! Now includes:
  
  • LLC Operating Agreement
  • Environmental Sustainability Section
  • Operations Section with Technology Discussion
• Updated! PowerPoint® Slideshow Template
  
  • Give the pitch that wins the deal. Present a compelling story to investors and lenders.
• Updated! Financial Model Worksheets
  
  • New! Financial Summary - a 4-page consolidation of income, balance-sheet, cash-flow, head-count and financing requirements - automatically generated, including graphs and charts
  • New! Start-Up & Capital Requirements sections
  • New! Use of Funds Summary: Takes the detail from the Start-Up' & 'Capital Requirements’ pages and shows investors how their investment will be used — includes bar & pie charts.
  • Expanded market and profit center categories: enable more flexibility & easier presentation of growth & profit expectations.
  • Updated Cash-flow Assumptions: Actual cash balance appears in cash-flow model provides immediate feedback of cash planning decisions.
  • Income Statement automatically calculates NOL carry-forward
• Valuation Model: Uses several proven methods for valuation including weighted average — how much is your business worth?
  • Calculates various scenarios: pre-money, post-money, stock give-up, etc.
  • New! Investor Scratch Pad: Let investors play with your assumptions and theirs on the Sensitivity (What-if…) Analysis page to see their ROI on your deal.
  • New! Capitalization Table: Shows the value of all shares as you bring in investors through several rounds of financing and ultimately 'exit' via merger or IPO.
• Numerous user-requested tweaks throughout.
• New! Automatic Back-Up & Restore
• New! Save your Business Plan as a .PDF — Makes sending to investors and lenders easy!
• New! Print directly to Kinko's!

I have been a long time customer of JIAN using BizPlanBuilder and Marketing Builder to start several companies including one public company, with three more in the works. Your products have saved me MUCH time and energy.  I also enjoyed your book, Business Black Belt — finding many parallels to my philosophies.
~ Russ Benefield, Pompano Beach, FL

Upgrade Features Overview: Easy. Fast. Professional.

If you haven't used BizPlanBuilder for a while, we've made a lot of improvements since the template versions!

• Upgraded user interface makes it easy to find plan documents, Excel workbooks, PowerPoint presentation and sample plans.
• Microsoft Office integration allows you to work in a familiar environment – you already know how to use it!
• Customizable, comprehensive Word templates form the basis for the entire business plan – Add/Edit/Format text any way you like!
• Menus show every tool – it’s easy to jump around and work where you want. The system keeps you organized.
• Progressive plan enables you to start small and build. Click the sections you want to include – add more later.
• Drag & Drop customization lets you change the order of the sections and organize your plan any way you like.
• Grab sections from any template set and build a custom plan to suit your business.
• Proven plan content & format has raised hundreds of millions through angels, banks, VCs, SBA and others.
• Tab from variable to variable – quickly fill in the blanks & complete the sentences.
• Written/edited by a former Sharper Image Catalog® copywriter – an effective, persuasive style structure you can follow and complete.
• Expert Comments throughout help you along the way – Turn them Off/On with just one click.
• Excel worksheets calculate figures & create impressive tables to support your plan.
• Quick-fill assumptions pages enable easy top-down or bottom-up forecasting.
• Project sales by product/line/marketing channel – including seasonal & mix adjustment.
• Customizable HR planning pages help you plan staffing, payroll and space requirements.
• One-click access to answers, experts, investors, market statistics & resources.
• 18,000+ business segment benchmarks back-up your marketing analysis & financial assumptions
• 34 ratios defined & measured with free access to BizStats to compare (we even offer ideas&help;).
• One-page “What-if...” shows best & worst case scenarios without replicating everything.
• Business valuation & investor analysis calculates ROI & stock give-up.
• Works equally well for external funding or bootstrapping approach.
• Publish your business plans to HTML format – Ideal for distributing your plan electronically.
• Build new plans from previous plans – create your own customizable templates.
• Free Video — "The Thinking Behind Your Business Plan"
• 350-page ebook — "The Handbook of Business Planning" full of expertise and time-tested wisdom on business and planning!
• Become fully literate in investor & lender requirements & terminology.
• 54 supporting documents to assure your success:
• Free PowerPoint template helps you produce a professional presentation quickly and easily.
• Cover letter templates to: Investors, Lenders, Friends…
• Investor tracking spreadsheet.
• Invite letters to Board members & advisors
• + $600 worth of extras!

Burke, I get your new version business plan every few years, it has always been the best on the market.
This latest version is the best yet, thank you.
- Ed Hoessman, www.igcassociates.com

Upgraded: Friendly + Flexible Financial Models

Whether you're writing a formal business plan for investors or developing a meaningful forecast for your business, the financial models Biz Plan Builder will make the process easier, faster and maybe —even fun! More details...

All Biz Plan Builder financial models are developed in linked Excel workbooks giving you complete flexibility to customize them to your requirements. You don't have to be a spreadsheet or financial expert. (If you are, you can customize everything in Excel.) Just enter your sales, expense, growth and other assumptions and let Biz Plan Builder run the calculations.

The sections of your plan that a lender will focus on include those addressing historical performance, projected future performance, and management experience. (If you need help putting together an appropriate business plan, try using JIAN's Biz Plan Builder software tool. It is easy to use and recognizable to most lenders.)
- Doug Hood, Rainmaker Capital, Atlanta, GA

Upgraded: Excel workbook links statements
Click across the tabs at the bottom of your screen to open any statement or assumption page. Simply fill-in / update the assumptions pages and Biz Plan Builder automatically generates all of your statements. (We designed the "Assumptions" pages to be part of your plan presentation—making it easy for investors and lenders to understand your business and the logic behind it.) When you click to assemble your entire plan, the Biz Plan Builder system will ask you which pages you want to include, then save a copy with just the pages you want to show. Investors and lenders have different requirements and you can easily select what you need so you'll be prepared with statement options:

• Year 1 by Months
• Years 2-3 by Quarters
• Years 1-5 by Year
• (All of the above)

Shows the math — makes explaining easy (It virtually does it or you.)

Show how believable numbers can add up—unlike other financial models (input-> [black-box] -> output), here you will see the math, and be able to explain "how you got there" in a clear and logical manner. See "what-if" when you change scenarios. It automatically calculates totals, percentages and ratios to show at a glance how much money you'll need, when you'll need it, and how soon you'll make a profit. It's easy to update—If you change a number, the spreadsheets automatically recalculate for you.

We used your Biz Plan Builder and obtained a $450,000 SBA loan in 5 days. This was after we had been told by a number of "experts" (legal & financial) that it would take at least 90 days to get an approval and the most we could hope for would be $50,000 to $150,000. We were a raw start-up with absolutely no assets. The only thing we had going for us was our experience in the same business and your business plan. Thanks for your part.
~ John K. Farr, II, www.AdhesiveFilms.com

Comprehensive, integrated financial forecasting model included:

• Set-up by products, product lines, or profit centers
• Incorporate up to 3-years of historical financial data to show past, present & future continuum
• Start-up Costs / Summary Use of Proceeds
• Headcount & Space Planning (out to 5 years)
• Demand/Revenue Model (list potential customers x share x prices)
• Assumptions - Sales (easily adjust mix & seasonality from tables)
• Assumptions - Marketing (use % of sales or actual)
• Assumptions - COGS (use % of sales or actual)
• Assumptions - R&D (use % of sales or actual)
• Assumptions - G&A (use % of sales or actual)
• Assumptions - Cash-flow (enter debt, equity, etc. — shows cash balance from cash-flow statement to make it easy to see the effects of changes)
• Assumptions - Balance Sheet (use historical numbers if available)
• Assumptions - Financing. Five integrated financial calculators help plan future loan financing and automatically calculate all interest expense, loan repayment cash-flow, and balance sheet entries.
• Capitalization Table
• Personal Financial Statement (perfect for attaching to loan applications, etc.)

Built-in expert advice on every page keeps you going

At the top of each page, you'll find an explanation of how to work with each worksheet. The cells requiring input also have bubble help — Roll your mouse over these cells for comments and suggestions for filling in each section of the model. Now you can do the math and understand your numbers and deal. (Even an "Artist" / non-financial person can use these models!)

Roll your mouse over any red triangle and an explanation immediately appears.
The "Cap Table" lets you play what-if? with certain stock scenarios and valuations.

Financial Statements Updated:

• Financial Summary - consolidation of financial projections, plus headcount and capital requirements - automatically generated, including graphs and charts
• Gross Profit Analysis (by product/service)
• Income Statement (+ NOL carry-forward)
• Balance Sheet (with out-of-balance flag)
• Cash-flow Projection
• Sensitivity Analysis (What-if... all on ONE page!)
• Comprehensive Ratio Analysis

(Shows 31 success indicators & trends—with ideas for corrections! Also includes direct links to BizStats.com enabling you to quickly compare with your industry. Free.)
• Valuation (see below)
• Investor Deal Development & Analysis (enables planning for several rounds of financing + IPO)
• Equity/Ownership Give-Up
(see section below)

Charts Included:

• Market Segments
• Units Sold
• Revenue Projections / Profit Center / Product
• Revenue / COGS / Profit
• Seasonal Sales
• Headcount Growth & Personnel / Department
• Use of Funds

  Charts & graphs can be easily customized in Excel to your needs.

Loan Wizard automatically manages up to 5 different loans

Modeling debt financing is easy.

Enter the loan start date, amount, and interest rate.

Interest expenses, cash flow and balance sheet line items are all automatically calculated — showing on separate line listings for each one on each statement for added clarity.

The blue text is variable so you can also label each loan with the title of your choice. These headings will also automatically copy to the Income Statement, Balance Sheet and Cash Flow statements where needed to identify their respective line-item calculations.

This helps dramatically to enable you to make adjustments where necessary and for investors and lenders to intuitively understand your plan.

Use this section to...

• Restructure debt to vendors.

• Purchase vehicles

• Borrow working capital

• Build up inventory

All loans are independently calculated so you can start them on any date from the beginning of your plan to any time in the future.

Financing Assumptions Statement below this "Loan Wizard" automatically summarizes all of your financing calculations here.

If / when you want to make a change, just update this page and everything else will recalculate and all changes will automatically appear in their proper places.

One of several Assumptions pages makes forecasting easy.

Updated: Revenue/Demand model demonstrates growth potential

It's important to demonstrate clearly the magnitude of your opportunity. Investors always want to know how big the "universe" of potential customers is. Input the entire universe of potential customers, then project your market share. Building upon that, estimate the % of customers who will buy at a given price... See how believable numbers add-up—by using BizPlanBuilder you'll be able to easily explain and justify your projections.

Easily segment your markets and estimate penetration rates — investors often look here first.

"How much is your deal worth?"

This is an important question. Investors will inevitably ask it... and you need to have a good answer—especially one that has some good analysis behind it. This is a big part of any financial model and we use several methods to triangulate a respectable valuation for your business as well as to provide a credible explanation that you can use:

Harvard Model
1st Chicago Method
Discounted Future Cash-flow
Common VC Formula
Weighted Average (all of the above)

Quickly analyze & compare various financing scenarios — for yourself as well as your investors

Return on Investment... Stock Give-up?

Given a certain amount of investment, how many shares would your investor(s) get? What % of the company would they own? (We included a calculation to help you see that you will still become wildly wealthy even when your investor(s) get rich too!) What might rounds two and three look like? If you went public, what might that look like? Perfect for busy CFOs as well as start-up entrepreneurs — the logical presentation especially saves time explaining to non-financial stake-holders. We also include a separate spreadsheet that helps you calculate your net return/profit if you were to sell your business.

Updated: Pre-Planning Tools

• Business Assessment Questions
• Executive Team Bio Template
• Personal Assessment Questions
• Personal Mission Statement
• Vision Statement
• Writing About Your Business

Updated: Plan Presentation Tools

• Cover Letters to Your:
• Banker (for Loan/Line of Credit)
• Leasing Agent
• Angel Investor
• Venture Capitalist
• Non-Disclosure Agreements for:
• Banker
• Leasing Agent
• Investment Banker
• Business Plan Distribution
• Deal Summary
• Elevator Pitch
• Email Introduction
• Service Business Start-Up Cash Requirements

Updated: Resource Materials

• Believable Projections
• Business Topics of Interest w/Internet Links
• Developing Your Management Team
• Things to Think About
• What Investors Look For

Updated: Supporting Documents

• Articles of Incorporation
• Core Values & Core Practices
• Executive Summary Template
• Executive Team Responsibilities
• General Partnership Agreement
• Investor Tracking
• Personal Financial Statement
• Press Release—Announcement
• Stock Options Tracking

Updated: Tools to Manage Your Business

• Application for Business Credit
• Business Start-Up Checklist
• Commercial Lease
• Due Diligence Checklist
• Independent Contractor Agreement
• Investor Game Plan
• Invitation to Board of Advisors
• Invitation to Board of Directors
• Management Notebook
• Lehman Formula Calculator
• Lehman Formula (Finder's Fee) Agreement
• Private Offering Disclaimer
• Proceeds of Sale of Business
• Service Feedback Survey
• Service Invoice Log
• Services List
• Space Requirements Planning
• Trademark Instructions
• Trademark Overview

In contrast to many other business-planning products, Jian has maintained a substantial upgrade schedule for Biz Plan Builder that provides incremental improvements, updates to business templates and a compelling reason to own the most current version.

Is it worth the upgrade to BizPlanBuilder v11?

Probably not if you have just written your business plan—just edit that and keep going. However, to take advantage of the new content as well as the multi-user, collaborative features and share files, purchasing this upgrade to write a new business plan is well worth it. (Your collaborators will also require licensed copies BizPlanBuilder as well.) Or, if you have any older version of BizPlanBuilder (or any other business plan software), and you want to write the best plan possible for today's market, then, yes, it would be worth it to upgrade to BizPlanBuilder v11.