From first budget line to final account.
Project Control & Feasibility Manager, Development Finance · ACCA · PIF-backed giga-projects · SAR 40bn+ portfolio
I work across the financial lifecycle of large-scale development programmes, from feasibility and funding through budget control, contract administration, forecasting, reporting and close-out. DevFin Lab turns that experience into interactive tools, models and practical resources.
Explore the Lab
Interactive, with sample dataProject Controls
Budget, commitment, actual, accrual, ETC and EAC, from project level down to each contract.
Contract viewLifecycle Lab
One contract from budget to close-out, showing commitment, exposure and forecast final account.
Treasury viewFunding Lab
Liquidity over 90, 180 or 360 days, stress scenarios and a downloadable capital call deck.
Reporting viewMonth-End Close
The development finance close checklist and the reports it produces.
Featured case studies
All case studies →Models and toolkit
Feasibility and debt
Hospitality and real estate feasibility, debt sizing and sculpting, and a cashflow S-curve.
ToolkitExcel templates and checklists
IPC certificate, commitment register, cost report, lifecycle checklists, accruals, cash forecast and more. Free.
ResourcesDevFin 101
How money moves through a development project, with a searchable glossary.
Athif Poovathikkal
ACCA-qualified development finance professional with 10+ years of experience: three years in financial control, capital calls and reporting for a PIF-backed SAR 40bn+ portfolio, and six years at EY building finance functions.
Get in touch
For roles, collaboration or feedback on DevFin Lab.
athifp.acca@gmail.com
LinkedIn profile →How I run development finance, in six stops
Each stop opens a working part of the lab. The right-hand note says what it shows about how I work.
Financial control, from project level down to each contract
Budget, commitments, actuals, accruals and forecasts at every level of the cost breakdown. Select a package to see its contracts. Figures are in SAR millions, status date .
Budget vs estimate at completion by package
Sample definitions: EAC = actual + accrual + estimate to complete (ETC), including uncommitted scope. Open exposure (pending VOs and notified claims) is shown separately and isn't included in EAC. Risk-adjusted EAC adds it back. Contingency is held centrally and excluded from the package variance.
One contract, from budget to close-out
Change the terms and changes on the left. The lab separates what is committed, what is exposed and what is forecast, and reconciles finance to site progress each month.
Commitment vs exposure vs forecast
Current contract value: what's been done
Baseline programme vs physical progress vs certified
Month-end accrual
Work done in the period but not yet certified or invoiced. Reverses on day 1 of the next period.
Sample contract assumptions. Certification lags physical progress by one month, and payment follows certification by one month. The advance is invoiced with VAT at M0. VAT on each IPC is charged on the gross value less advance recovery (VAT was already charged on the advance), and retention is withheld from payment only. Actual VAT treatment depends on the contract and ZATCA rules.
SPI uses earned value on the baseline scope: EV = original contract (BAC) × baseline physical % complete; PV = BAC × baseline planned %. VO scope progresses from its approval month and doesn't change the value of work already done.
Liquidity forecast and capital call
A rolling cash forecast by vendor, tested against a minimum cash buffer. Choose the horizon, stress the forecast, and download the capital call pack as a presentation.
Closing cash vs minimum buffer
Sources and uses
Payments by vendor
excl. VATSample assumptions: input VAT on vendor invoices is paid with each invoice and refunded two months later. Debt interest is paid quarterly. The capital call is the largest shortfall against the buffer within the horizon. Facility conditions precedent aren't modelled. The same model is in the Toolkit as an Excel file.
Closing
The development finance close, in the order I run it. Complete each step and close the period to generate the reporting pack.
reporting pack
Period closedFinancial models that answer real questions
Each one runs in the browser. The full Excel versions are in the Toolkit.
Stabilised year (operating year 3)
EBITDA by year (SAR M)
ConstructionOperationsSample assumptions: three-year build with cost spread evenly, occupancy ramps 70% → 90% → 100% of stabilised, 3% annual ADR growth, 10 operating years, exit on forward EBITDA at the cap rate less 2% sale costs. Debt is interest-only, drawn pro rata with equity, and repaid at exit.
Sensitivity: change in profit (SAR M)
DSCR by year
Monthly cash out vs cumulative
Sample contract assumption: 50% of retention is released at the taking-over certificate (TOC) and 50% at the end of the defects liability period (DLP). Both releases are paid after the same payment lag.
Free templates for development finance teams
Confirm your email once and every download unlocks. Your details are used to deliver the files, and for updates only if you opt in.
How money moves through a development project
The procure-to-pay cycle for a construction contract, with the document and the control at each step.
Retention
Part of each payment is held back as security for defects. A common arrangement returns half at handover (TOC) and the rest when the defects period ends, but the contract sets the terms.
Why accruals matter
Certification and invoicing often lag the period in which work is done. Without an accrual for that work, cost reports understate spend and cash forecasts look better than reality.
Commitment vs. spend
Budget control happens at commitment (PO or contract), not at payment. By the time an invoice arrives, the commercial obligation may already be committed against the project budget.
Glossary
Athif Poovathikkal
Project Control & Feasibility Manager · Development Finance
PIF-backed giga-projects · Real estate · Hospitality · Infrastructure · Riyadh
Development finance, from project reality to financial decision-making
ACCA-qualified development finance professional with 10+ years of experience. For the past three years I have supported financial control and reporting for a PIF-backed tourism, real estate and hospitality portfolio exceeding SAR 40 billion: budgets, commitments, cash flow forecasting, capital calls, accruals, month-end close and contract close-out. Before that, I spent six years at EY building and running client finance functions, from chart of accounts to ERP go-live. I work closely with design, construction, procurement and PMO teams to turn what happens on site into reliable numbers for management, the board and the shareholder.
What I do
Financial control and cost management
- Budgets, commitments, certified progress, accruals and final accounts
- Budget and contract checks on awards, VOs and change requests
- Cost-to-complete, EAC and contingency trends
Cash flow, capital calls and funding
- Rolling short- and long-term portfolio forecasts
- Scenario analysis for slippage, scope change and escalation
- Capital call submissions to the shareholder (PIF)
Budgeting, reporting and audit
- Annual budget and multi-year business plan
- Monthly management and PIF reporting pack
- Month-end and year-end close; audit focal point
Systems and business partnering
- Oracle EPM, Oracle Fusion and Primavera Unifier
- Power BI dashboards and automated monthly reporting
- Design reviews, cost workshops and progress meetings
Experience
Project Control & Feasibility Manager
Destinations Development Company · PIF-backed RiyadhSAR 40bn+ tourism, hospitality and real estate development portfolio.
- Development financial control across budget, commitments, actuals, accruals, ETC and EAC
- Portfolio cash forecasting and capital calls to PIF
- Month-end close, variance analysis, management, PIF and Board reporting, audit and governance
- Finance slides on budgets and cost positions for Board of Directors meetings chaired at the highest level of the Kingdom's leadership
- Power BI dashboards and an automated monthly reporting pack for the CFO and executive management, integrating Oracle Fusion, Unifier and EPM data with team inputs
- Feasibility and bankability inputs, and partnering with design, construction, procurement and PMO
- System design participation, UAT and business-case testing for Oracle Fusion, Oracle EPM and Primavera Unifier, with some Primavera P6 exposure, explaining finance requirements to IT so the systems work for development finance in practice
Senior Consultant, Accounting, Compliance & Reporting
EY JeddahBuilt and ran finance functions for multinational market entrants and large start-ups, from a blank slate through ERP go-live to handover to in-house teams. Reported to client CFOs and boards.
- Finance function set-up: chart of accounts, policies, reporting calendars and controls
- ERP implementations from requirements to hypercare (Oracle Fusion, SAP, MS Dynamics NAV, QuickBooks), and bookkeeping on NAV and QuickBooks
- Month-end close, IFRS financial statements, VAT and Zakat
- Financial modelling, feasibility and audit readiness
- Finance lead for a SAR 30bn+ family estate with real estate at its core: monthly heir-level status reports for four heirs and a charity share (equity, withdrawals by asset type, movement in estate equity, assets pending legal documentation), plus the estate's accounting, valuations, distributions and legal coordination from a finance perspective
Lecturer, Financial Accounting & Financial Management
Phoenix Financial Training Dubai · DohaTaught ACCA financial accounting, management accounting and financial management.
Expertise and systems
- Project cost control
- CAPEX and commitments
- EAC and forecasting
- Funding and capital calls
- Feasibility and debt
- Contract close-out
- Oracle Fusion
- Oracle EPM
- Primavera Unifier and P6
- SAP
- MS Dynamics NAV
- QuickBooks
- Anaplan
- Power BI dashboards and automated reporting
- Advanced Excel and financial modelling
- AI-assisted finance dashboards and reporting automation
Qualifications
- ACCAMember, Association of Chartered Certified Accountants
- PMPProject Management Professional, PMIIn progress, completing 2026
- FMVAFinancial Modeling & Valuation Analyst, CFI
- CMSACapital Markets & Securities Analyst, CFI
- IFRSCertificate in International Financial Reporting, ACCA
- M.ComMaster of CommerceUniversity of Madras
- B.ComBachelor of CommerceMahatma Gandhi University
- IHMIntroduction to Hospitality ManagementCollege of Business, Florida Atlantic University.
English (professional) · Arabic (reading and writing fluent, basic spoken) · Based in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
Interested in the work behind the profile?
Development Finance in Practice
Drawn from my roles at Destinations Development Company and EY. Situation, task, action and result, with no confidential figures.
More case studies to follow.
Finance architecture, domain logic and AI-assisted product development
The hard part wasn't the code. It was turning development finance processes into logic a system can run: commitments, exposure, accruals, certification lags, retention, funding gaps. I defined that logic and used AI to build it.
Finance architecture
- Control hierarchy: project → WBS → package → contract → IPC
- Commitment vs exposure vs forecast
- Close, accrual and funding processes
Domain logic
- Payment mechanics, VAT, retention and advance rules
- Earned value on baseline scope
- Every assumption stated on the page
AI-assisted build
- Claude wrote the code from my specifications
- I reviewed and corrected every formula
- Iterated from mockup to production
Build log
Built with
- Claude for design, code and model logic, reviewed line by line
- Plain HTML, CSS and JavaScript, with no framework
- PptxGenJS to build the capital call deck in the browser
- Excel templates built with formulas, validation and control checks
- Netlify for hosting and form handling
Owner sign-in
Owner access only.
My workspace
Travel agents
My Claude trip planners and itinerary archive.
Link to addPersonal finance
Expenses, budget and savings plan dashboard.
Link to addInvestments
Portfolio tracker and allocation.
Link to addPlanning
Schooling, goals and key dates.
Link to add