Fractional CFO in London, Ontario
Senior financial leadership for London and southwestern Ontario businesses that have outgrown bookkeeping but aren’t ready for a full-time CFO. Forecasting, margin clarity, and reporting your lenders and board can trust, delivered in person.
A fractional CFO who knows the London and southwestern Ontario market.
London anchors southwestern Ontario with a deep, diversified economy: manufacturing, healthcare, insurance and financial services, and a growing technology sector. It is large enough to generate serious mid-market companies and far enough from Toronto that senior finance talent is genuinely scarce.
Manufacturing and food processing, a major healthcare and education cluster, insurance and financial services, and an expanding tech scene give London a broad base of companies that need real financial leadership. Many are mid-market firms that have never had a CFO and are running on a controller or an external bookkeeper alone.
London is at the edge of my regular drive-to service area, and the mid-market manufacturing, multi-entity, and lender-facing work that dominates here is precisely the profile I built my controller and CFO experience around.
The CFO layer your business is missing.
Right-sized senior finance, the forward-looking work a bookkeeper or controller is not positioned to own.
01 Forecasting & cash strategy
Driver-based forecasts and a real cash runway, so you see the next two to four quarters before they arrive instead of reacting to them.
02 Margin & profitability clarity
Where you actually make money, by job, product, client, or line, and where margin is quietly leaking out.
03 Board & lender reporting
Reporting and covenant tracking that hold up with banks, sureties, boards, and investors, no month-end spreadsheet scramble.
04 Finance operations & systems
The operating rhythm and the clean data underneath it, including fixing the software feeding your books when that’s the real problem.
Drivable from Hamilton, present when it counts.
I serve London and southwestern Ontario with scheduled on-site time plus a tight remote cadence in between, close enough to be present for the moments that matter, structured enough to stay efficient. I cover London and southwestern Ontario, including St. Thomas, Strathroy, and the 401 corridor, and I deliberately do not chase the Toronto, Mississauga, or Brampton core, staying focused on this region is what lets me actually show up. London is anchored by health sciences, a major insurance cluster (Canada Life and Great-West among them), advanced manufacturers like 3M and McCormick, and 350-plus tech and SaaS firms, a genuinely diversified base that rewards clean, comparable numbers.
Most fractional CFOs can’t fix the software feeding your books. I can.
Here is the edge most fractional CFOs in London and southwestern Ontario can’t offer: if your numbers are unreliable because the field or operational software was never set up to feed your accounting system cleanly, I can fix the source. Steel City CFO also runs a financial-systems practice connecting tools like ServiceTitan, Procore, and Jobber into QuickBooks or Sage.
That second service line, Financial Systems Architecture, is what makes the CFO work stick. When the data is clean at the source, the reporting, forecasting, and lender conversations all get easier, and the monthly close stops being a fire drill.
Fractional CFO for your industry in London.
The playbook changes by sector. Here is how the work looks for each industry, locally.
Construction & Trades
Fractional CFO for construction businesses in London.
London, OntarioManufacturing
Fractional CFO for manufacturing businesses in London.
London, OntarioSoftware & SaaS
Fractional CFO for software & SaaS businesses in London.
London, OntarioProfessional Services
Fractional CFO for professional services businesses in London.
Who you’re actually working with.
Big Four-trained finance leadership, in your corner.
Steel City CFO is led by Kevin Cosgrove. The background behind the work spans high-growth SaaS, a $50M+ construction and industrial group, and prior fractional CFO engagements across Canada, the same range of problems London and southwestern Ontario businesses bring to the table.
- Series B/C SaaS, independent fractional CFO work for venture-backed software companies (US + Canada): 3-statement models, ARR forecasting, ASC 606, board reporting.
- Controller, $50M+ group, heavy-civil construction, asphalt, and real estate: WIP, covenants, multi-entity consolidation.
- Prior fractional CFO, startups and mid-market firms across Canada: forecasting, lender reporting, finance ops built from scratch.
- Sell-side M&A exit, led the finance workstream on a venture-backed company’s acquisition by a strategic buyer.
Big Four (PwC) trained. Hamilton-based, serving clients across the Golden Horseshoe in person.
Serving the wider Golden Horseshoe.
Transparent pricing for London businesses.
A fixed-fee start, then a right-sized retainer.
The Diagnostic Audit. A focused review of your finances and the systems feeding them, with quantified findings and a clear recommendation. No retainer, no open meter, you get the map first.
The audit, step by stepA right-sized monthly retainer once the foundation is clean: forecasting, reporting, lender and board support, and an operating rhythm you can run the business on. Scope and price scale to your size.
Book a CallNeed a fractional CFO in London, Ontario?
Book a call. We’ll talk through where your finances stand and whether the $750 + HST Diagnostic Audit is the right first step.