We step into messy, high-stakes situations as executive partners — stabilizing companies, sourcing or restructuring capital and capital partners, and leading the relationships that determine the outcome.
Red Lion Advisory is an executive advisory firm for private companies, founders, family offices, and capital allocators navigating growth, capital events, and special situations.
We combine CEO/CFO-level leadership, deep capital markets experience, and real operating discipline to turn chaos into a clear plan — and a closed transaction.
We step in as interim or fractional CEO, CFO, or CRO to lead through restructurings, turnarounds, and complex transactions — not just advise from the sidelines.
We design, structure, and negotiate financing across the entire capital stack — backed by decades of treasury and capital markets experience.
We stabilize liquidity, create one version of the truth, reset expectations with boards and lenders, and install the accountability needed to restore momentum.
Active relationships with lenders, private credit, family offices, institutional investors, and strategic buyers — and we know how to build trust fast on both sides of the table.
We help companies at inflection points — and in the right cases, we'll run them, buy them, and grow them.
When a company needs a leader — not a consultant — we take the seat. We deploy as interim CEO, COO, or CRO, bringing operating discipline, decision-making authority, and real accountability. We don't just advise the role. We fill it.
Interim CEO · COO · CRO · Fractional Leadership · C-Suite Deployment
In the right situations, we move beyond advisory and acquire companies directly — alongside family offices, capital partners, and co-investors. When the fit is right, we bring our own capital, our own operators, and our full conviction to the table.
Direct Acquisitions · Co-Investment · Family Office Partnerships
We raise capital, design strategy, and drive operational performance — then stay through execution to ensure the plan becomes results. Growth isn't just a goal we set with you. It's a process we manage through closing and well beyond.
Capital Raises · Operational Scaling · Post-Close ExecutionMost of our work starts at an inflection point: the model has broken, the capital stack no longer fits reality, or stakeholders have lost confidence in the current plan. These are the kinds of situations where we do our best work.
Cash is tight, covenants are in question, vendors are nervous. We stabilize liquidity, implement real cash visibility, and re-open productive conversations with lenders and key counterparties.
The existing debt and equity mix doesn't fit the business anymore. We re-underwrite the company, design a fit-for-purpose capital structure, and lead a targeted process to secure new capital or restructure existing facilities.
The company is off plan, board pressure is building, and ad-hoc cost cuts aren't fixing the core issues. We bring one version of the truth, reset the plan, and align management, sponsors, and lenders around a credible path forward.
The business is compelling, but the finance function and narrative are not deal-ready. We act as transaction-ready CFO and deal leader — tightening the numbers, anticipating diligence, and managing capital partner relationships.
The opportunity is real, but growth is burning too much cash and straining stakeholders. We redesign the growth and capital plan so the company can survive its own upside — and build a structure that lenders and investors can back.
We are not a back-office finance shop. We lead from the front — in the boardroom, with lenders and investors, alongside management and employees. Our mandates are embedded and execution-focused, not arms-length consulting projects.
Embedded executive roles: interim/fractional CEO, CFO, CRO, or turnaround leader as needed.
Hands-on with boards, attorneys, lenders, and investors throughout the process — not just at kick-off.
One integrated roadmap for operations, capital, and stakeholder management — owned and driven by us.
We stay through execution, not just the strategy deck.
We step into the seat with full mandate — owning the P&L, the lender relationships, and the board conversation.
When the situation requires an independent voice with full authority, we carry the mandate from day one — stabilizing, restructuring, and positioning for the next chapter.
We manage the process end-to-end — financial modeling, diligence, lender and investor management, negotiate terms, and drive to close.
We serve as the independent expert voice boards and special committees need when management is conflicted or the situation is too complex for existing advisors.
We maintain deep, working relationships with capital providers, commercial partners, and specialist service firms across the full capital stack and value chain. These are long-standing relationships built through years of successfully closing complex transactions together — not just names in a database.
We "architect" how you show up to the market: sharpening the story, the strategy, and the numbers so capital providers and partners can underwrite your opportunity with confidence. We anticipate the questions before they're asked, and we prepare you to answer them.
We help you see the real potential in complex or messy situations — framing, structuring, and negotiating solutions that work in practice, not just in a spreadsheet. Our track record gives capital providers a trusted on-the-ground partner who reduces execution risk.
We don't just access capital — we prepare companies and capital partners for each other.
We sit at the intersection of operating leadership and capital markets. We translate messy realities into bankable stories, design structures that fit the business, and negotiate outcomes that work for both companies and capital providers.
We maintain active relationships with capital providers across the spectrum — not just contact lists. Many of these relationships were built over years of closing complex, multi-party transactions together.
In many situations, our role is to match the right company with the right capital — and to prepare both sides to work together. We “spruce up” clients so they show up to capital providers with clear numbers, a coherent plan, and a structure that respects both risk and upside. At the same time, we help capital partners see the true potential behind complex stories and structure solutions that are executable for management.
We’ve been borrowers, bankers, investors, and operators — we understand each side’s constraints and objectives.
We lead from inside the company, not from a distance — aligning operations, numbers, and narrative before we ever go to market.
We bring real, long-standing relationships that open doors and accelerate trust.
We care as much about the post-closing reality as the term sheet — structure has to work in practice, not just on paper.
Our experience spans education, financial services, manufacturing, energy, and more — across growth, transition, and special situations. Representative highlights from our leadership's prior roles include:
Led the disposal of the largest private student receivable portfolio ever sold in the proprietary education sector, including a revenue-sharing structure on future collections — a first-of-its-kind transaction requiring direct buyer and servicer relationships to execute.
While the company was publicly-traded, managed a $625M syndicated credit facility, a $600M intercompany credit agreement, and an innovative $175M insurance-supported letter of credit — while originating a new $150M credit facility through direct bank relationships when the company went private. A multi-layered capital structure executed under strict timeline and confidentiality constraints.
Led a 2.5× expansion of a bespoke private credit facility for a distressed manufacturer's European business — resulting in a 3× increase in orders and approximately 70% market share in the product line. A direct example of capital enabling operational recovery and growth.
Sold a $100M+ distressed private student loan portfolio at 2× the average competing bid — driven by direct relationships with the buyer and servicer that made the transaction executable when others could not close it.
Built a 10-year LBO model for a private equity roll-up targeting 7 acquisitions across three-phase capital deployment — incorporating multi-tranche debt with PIK interest, consolidated pro forma financials, Monte Carlo simulation (1,000+ iterations), and industry-specific unit economics. Engagement included distributor lifecycle analytics, cohort retention curves, and commission engine calculations, demonstrating the ability to model niche business dynamics well beyond generic financial projections.
RLA built an LCOS techno-economic model benchmarking the client's aluminum-ion chemistry against lithium-ion and solid-state alternatives, paired with a fully integrated financial model, cap table scenario analysis, competitive market mapping across twelve verticals, and a complete suite of investor-facing materials — equipping leadership to engage institutional investors with a defensible, data-driven narrative.
Transactions shown are representative of experience of Red Lion Advisory professionals, including prior roles. Past performance is not indicative of future results.
Red Lion Advisory is led by Simit Shah, a senior finance, capital markets and business transformation executive who has served as CFO, Treasurer, and interim C-suite leader, while using treasury, capital structure, and deal-making to drive strategy, growth, and value creation for PE and Family office backed, distressed, and growth companies. He blends CXO/CEO/CFO-level Commercial and Financial leadership with stakeholder-facing execution across capital raising, complex financings, and business transformations in dynamic, high-stakes environments.
Simit brings over two decades of experience closing complex transactions, leading organizations through high-stakes inflection points, and building the institutional relationships that determine outcomes. He has structured, marketed and executed over $2B in capital across debt, equity, and structured products — and led the operational side of some of the largest transactions in his sectors.
He is known for being direct, deeply networked, and able to move at the speed of a transaction rather than a consultant. With entrepreneurial tenacity, resiliency, and tactical rigor, he builds trusted relationships with boards, executives, lenders, investors, and operating teams across the globe. He thrives in ambiguity, wears multiple hats, and is often tapped to solve urgent capital structure, liquidity, and growth challenges. He holds an MBA from the University of Michigan Ross School of Business and graduated from Villanova University with a BS in Chemistry.
View full profile on LinkedInIdris Elgabalawy is a strategic finance and capital markets executive who serves as Director at Red Lion Advisory, where he leads execution across the firm's M&A advisory, capital raising, restructuring, and fractional CFO engagements. He operates as a principal-level execution partner — building the financial architecture, deal frameworks, and analytical infrastructure that drive transactions from thesis through close.
Idris has led or co-led financial modeling and transaction advisory across mandates ranging from $5M acquisitions to $500M+ multi-tranche capital deployments, spanning buy-side and sell-side M&A, recapitalizations, joint venture structuring, leveraged buyouts, and growth equity raises. His work product sits at the intersection of investment banking–grade analytics and hands-on operational execution — integrated financial models with monthly granularity across five business units, multi-party recapitalization frameworks with earnout and rollover equity mechanics, ten-year LBO models with PIK structures and waterfall returns analysis, and enterprise valuations across DCF, comparable transactions, and precedent methodologies.
He brings particular depth in complex, multi-stakeholder transactions — structuring deals where capital structure, governance, and operational transition must be designed simultaneously. He has built cap table models across SAFEs, convertible notes, and priced equity rounds for 75+ investors, structured management buyouts with phased seller exits, and developed investment memoranda for capital raises exceeding $100M.
Idris operates across energy and cleantech, defense and aerospace, healthcare, manufacturing, and consumer products — with fluency in sector-specific technical modeling, from unit economics and cost build-ups in emerging technology to working capital dynamics and covenant compliance in asset-heavy operating businesses.
Idris holds a B.S. in Finance with a concentration in Financial Analysis from California State University, Northridge.
View full profile on LinkedIn
We work with a tight group of clients — the ones facing situations where getting the wrong advisor, or moving too slowly, has real consequences.
Start a Conversation →Companies at inflection — liquidity events, capital raises, operational crises, transitions to professional management.
Independent directors who need a principal with capital markets depth, credibility, and no conflicts to lead a process.
Portfolio companies that need an interim operator or deal leader who can move at the speed of a transaction — not a consulting engagement.
Capital providers who need a trusted counterpart to evaluate, structure, or restructure an exposure — and who will tell them the truth.
Whether you're facing a liquidity crunch, a complex recap, or a strategic pivot that can't fail — we're built to step in early and lead.