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Ventura Pranas: Accounting without Borders

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Prabha Srinivasan,Co-Founder & Director

Prabha Srinivasan, Co-Founder & Director

The bilateral trade channel between the U.S. and India is one of the busiest international business corridors. With thousands of HNIs & entrepreneurs continuing to take their business beyond the borders, the trade between the two global powers is estimated to have jumped substantially from $118 billion in 2016 to $140 billion in 2017. Of late, the Indian Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has made it clear that the goal of increasing the annual trade between the U.S. and India to $500 billion is no more a ‘distant dream’. This makes further sense while thinking about India’s recent improvement (by 23 positions) in the World Bank’s ease of doing business index, not to mention the increasing number of Indian entrepreneurs expanding/migrating their operations to the U.S.

The single most challenge these cross-border business owners face is to navigate through the compliance intricacies in these two heterogeneous jurisdictions. But coordinating with two accountants – an Indian Chartered Accountant (CA) and a U.S. Certified Public Accountant (CPA), who work in two different time zones & don’t often talk to each other – more often than not culminates in costly mistakes for the client. This drastic predicament validates the emergence of Ventura Pranas, a full-service firm blending the capabilities of a U.S. CPA firm and an Indian CA firm to enable clients the convenience of dealing with a single point-of-contact and most importantly, one person for all their accounting needs in both the jurisdictions. Headquartered in California with operations in Washington, Chennai, Bangalore, and Hyderabad, Ventura Pranas fades the borders of accounting for its clients in the U.S. and India by constituting a one-stop-shop solution that amalgamates full-fledged accounting services, including Tax, Bookkeeping, and Audit & Advisory under one roof.

Accounting & Much More
It’s interesting the way Ventura Pranas uses its strong capabilities, which traces back to the sheer talent of its cross-border experienced team (most of them are U.S. CPAs, Enrolled Agents, and Indian CAs), to become flexible and in turn serve a wide horizon of clients. For instance, due to continuous regulatory amendments in the country, American CPA firms are said to have a dearth of experienced CPA talent. Ventura Pranas rises up to this opportunity and provides a full range of tax, audit, accounting, and bookkeeping services geared towards assisting CPA firms in the U.S., which will enable them to grow their top line without a ballooning cost of servicing the incremental revenue. “We have partnered with both very large CPA firms and smaller ones in providing them with this capability. This service offering keeps our staff completely up-to-speed with the ever-changing tax and regulatory framework in the US which keeps us at the top of our game,” explains Prabha Srinivasan, Co-Founder & Director, Ventura Pranas, who boasts of her stellar qualifications ACA (India), MBA (U.S.), CPA (U.S.) & Grad CWA (India), and several years of accounting experience ideally spread across both the jurisdictions. On the other hand, it not only helps business-owners setup their parent/subsidiary organization in India/U.S. by navigating them through the stringent compliance requirements and advising them on the right markets in the country (and also other low-tax jurisdictions like Singapore, Hong Kong, & Ireland), but also provides individuals, startups & SMEs with outsourced CFO functions.

“We help business owners reduce time spent on non-essential tasks, enable them to focus on core business functions, and thus increase their profitability. Through various schemes that IRS has brought out over the years, we have also rescued many HNIs from accounting mistakes that could have cost them heavily. This is exactly why most of the top
executives of leading MNCs choose us, even though they have the means to access and afford the Big-4,” asserts Prabha.

"Ventura Pranas fades the borders of accounting for its clients in the U.S. and India by constituting a one-stop-shop solution that amalgamates full-fledged accounting services under one roof"

The Path of Success
The story of Ventura Pranas originally traces back to Prabha’s passion and her cross-border accounting experience, including one at a Big-4 firm. With an undergraduate degree in Commerce, she is certified as both CA & CWA from India. In her pursuit of passion, the first turning point was, however, taking a flight to Los Angeles in 1996. Prabha went-on to obtain CPA licensure & MBA in Entrepreneurship, and worked in the U.S. for 12 years before coming back to India. She returned to the subcontinent in 2008 with the goal of helping a large Southern-California based regional firm to establish its captive subsidiary in India. She in fact, helped grow the professional team to a 100-member strong group within a matter of months, and in the process, discerned one of the biggest challenges that the clients face – the need for a single contact point to deal with all their tax planning and compliance needs in both the countries by using technology to bridge boundaries. In 2011, she incepted her own firm, Ventura Pranas, along with Satish Sridharan (a technologist and the Co-Founder & CEO of Ventura Pranas) to provide clients with this convenience.

The operations of Ventura Pranas initially started with outsourced accounting services for an offshore client based on the arbitrage of accounting KPO between India and the U.S., and over the years, the company has successfully transformed into a full-service CPA accounting firm growing phenomenally. Alongside Prabha and Satish, Ventura Pranas’ board of advisors that comprises of industry legends like Dr. Sridhar Mitta, Dr. Vivek Mansingh & Rajeev Mohan, who bring more than 100 years of cumulative experience, has also played a pivotal role in the company growing at 35-40 percent year-on-year.

Trust – The Game Changer
A lion share of this success can be attributed to the trust factor that the company has instilled among its clients, not to mention the ease of doing business with Ventura Pranas. Needless to say, trust engenders from uncompromised security of client data. Prabha explains, “As a CPA firm, the data transfers are governed by stringent IRS rules. We deploy a multi-layer security system to ensure data security, starting right from storing data in our internal servers with several redundancies and comprehensive anti-virus protection on all software. In addition to this, we have complete 24/7 monitoring systems with Fire, Motion, and Temperature sensors”. No wonder Ventura Pranas’ track record has been impeccable with no occurrence of any data compromise. However, she says the single most important factor that no technology can ever wish to bind is the firm’s relentless emphasis on ethics. “We have set very high standards in our recruitment drives in looking for such values even before people set foot into our organization. Once they are part of our brood, adhering to ethics and treating client information with utmost care and concern becomes a daily mantra that we all live by,” says Prabha.

People consider ease of doing business as well as they look for trust. Ventura Pranas has also been leading the way in integrating technology with its endeavors towards smoothening the user interface and improving & adapting according to the client feedback. In addition, its comprehensive homegrown ERP systems enable secure data transfer, afford clients the ability to track progress and provide for timely delivery of promised services in a cost-effective way. The firm constantly strives to learn from its customer feedback, and some of the largest firm-wide initiatives have been from customer feedback.

The Next Big Thing
“Of late, we have been receiving a lot of requests to make a mobile interface for our platform, wherein clients want the convenience of working on their taxes while on the move. In the next few months, we are launching our app, which would
be quite a remarkable tool for our clients – both at an institutional & individual level,” adjoins Prabha. Their goal is to forge more relationships with business and employers in providing a valuable benefit to their employees as part of their global relocation package. “This year alone, we have closed strategic tie-ups with more than a dozen large Wealth Management firms to assist clients in the U.S./India to make more knowledgeable decisions on their investment portfolios,” adds Prabha. With the firm assisting their clients with all their cross-border tax, accounting, estate planning and advisory, the new Family Office group that it has launched seems right down its alley. Prabha explains, “Our clients are asking more of us and we take their feedback seriously! This new group has been started at the behest of our clients who have grown with us”. En route to the future, Ventura Pranas is looking forward to accelerate its growth to 60-70 percent, with plans to quintuple its revenues in the next three years and expand its expertise to cover other jurisdictions such as the UK and Canada. While the launch of the mobile interface immediately makes real sense to Ventura Pranas’ near-future growth anticipations, the emerging demand points to its vision of becoming the foremost respected customer-centric firm of Accountants – without borders!

Ventura Pranas helps business-owners setup their parent/subsidiary organization in India/U.S. by navigating them through the stringent compliance requirements and advising them on the right markets in the country

Key Management:
Prabha Srinivasan, Co-Founder & Director
An ACA, MBA (U.S.), CPA (U.S.) & Grad CWA, Prabha has served a diversified clientele throughout her professional career spanning across the U.S. & India. She began her Public Accounting Career in 1996 in the U.S. and relocated to India in 2008. She has since been spending time in both the U.S. and India to manage the firm’s relationships with clients in both countries.

Satish Sridharan, Co-Founder & CEO
Satish is a B.Tech graduate from the IIT Madras and M.S in Electrical & Computer Engineering from the University of Arizona. His career started with Vitesse Semiconductor based in California in 1995. Today, he manages the technology and all corporate strategy planning & implementation for Ventura Pranas.

Ventura Pranas in Spotlight:

•Ability to handle cross-border client requirements in the U.S. and India under one roof.
•The clients deal with only one firm and most often with just one person for all their accounting needs in both the jurisdictions.
•A large talent pool of CAs, CA Interns and CPAs.
•Founders, who live in both the U.S. & India, are backed by a thorough understanding of the industry and business practices in both countries.
•Supported and advised by an eminent board of advisors with rich experience in MNCs and Corporate realm.


Quick Facts:
Year of Establishment:
2011
Offices:
California (Headquarter), Washington, Chennai, Bangalore & Hyderabad

Offerings:
•Tax planning and compliance for individuals and business entities in the U.S. & India
•U.S. GAAP Audits
•Corporate Governance (U.S. & India)
•Outsourced CFO Functions (U.S. & India)
•Transfer pricing Documentation and Certification.
•Business Structuring on parent & holding companies


Client Talks:
“Ventura Pranas manages our U.S. & India personal income tax filings. By handling our Indian corporate governance, accounting, and complete CFO functions, they allow us to focus on what we do best as a company. One firm handling all the personal & corporate compliance & income tax requirements makes what usually is an onerous & cumbersome process a lot simpler,” ~ Srinath Sridharan, CEO, Aura Semiconductors.