A valuation is only useful if someone reads it. The calculator that produces the number is the start of the workflow, not the end. By the time an intangible asset valuation reaches its real audience — a board reviewing a capital-allocation decision, a lender deciding whether to advance against IP, an acquirer running diligence — the number itself is the easy part. The hard part is putting it in a form that lets each of those audiences interrogate the figure, see the assumptions behind it, and use it for the decision in front of them.
The Asset Valuator in Opagio Intangibles gives you two outputs you can take out of the platform. The first is a Report Studio PDF report, a paginated document you can download and share with a board, a lender or an acquirer. The second is a scenario comparison CSV, which sets up to four saved scenarios side by side and opens in Excel or Google Sheets. Both are built from the figures in your saved scenarios. Neither is a signed valuation, and Opagio is not a valuer.
This guide walks through what each output contains, what each leaves out, who each is for and how to check them before you share them. These are reports on intangible assets; for the valuation of a whole company or a shareholding, which an independent valuer prepares for a sale, a dispute or HMRC, see our guide to the business valuation report.
A valuation that lives only inside the platform is a working file, not a deliverable. The board paper that sits in front of an Audit Committee, the data room exhibit that an acquirer's lawyers comb through, the lender pitch pack that goes to a credit committee — those are documents. They have to print correctly, hand over cleanly and make sense weeks or months after the original calculation was run.
Three audiences shape what you need from the Asset Valuator, and each needs a different cut of the same saved figures:
| Audience | What They Need | Which Output Helps |
|---|---|---|
| The valuer or CFO running the workflow | The fair value and main inputs of each scenario, side by side | Scenario comparison CSV |
| The board, lender or acquirer reading the output | A document they can read, file and refer back to | Report Studio PDF report |
| The diligence team challenging the valuation | The inputs behind each figure, and the evidence behind the inputs | The CSV for the inputs; the PDF's evidence log and your own records for the evidence |
An output makes a figure portable. It does not make the figure right. The judgement still sits with the person who chose the assumptions and, where an independent valuation is required, with a qualified valuer.
The Report Studio PDF is the deliverable for the audience that will never open your scenarios. It is the document that lands in a board pack, sits in a data room folder or attaches to a lender pitch. You choose an audience preset (investors, board, internal management, exit readiness, fundraise readiness or a buyer due-diligence pack), adjust the sections, pick a cover style and an accent colour, and download the result.
The report is built from a catalogue of sections. The ones most relevant to valuation work are:
| Section | What It Shows |
|---|---|
| Executive summary | The opening page for the reader |
| Value Drivers Register summary | Each live asset with its class, status and value, and the total assessed value |
| Valuation summary | A table of the method, scenario name and enterprise value for your saved valuation scenarios |
| Spend by value driver | How much was invested in each of the Opagio 12 value drivers over the period |
| Appendix: evidence log | The evidence entries recorded against each asset, with their kind, reference and date added |
Other sections cover the KPI snapshot, revenue and EBITDA, key ratios, lending readiness and, for sale and fundraising presets, the adjusted EBITDA bridge. A section with nothing behind it says so rather than showing a blank, for example "No saved valuation scenarios."
The PDF does not include a sensitivity analysis or a valuation range, and it is not a full methodology write-up. It reports the figures you have saved. If a reader needs to see how the fair value moves when the discount rate or royalty rate moves, share the sensitivity table from the Asset Valuator itself, which is available for Relief from Royalty, MPEEM, Replacement Cost and With and Without.
The Compare Scenarios page in the Asset Valuator exports up to four of your saved scenarios side by side as one CSV file. It is the working artefact for the valuer and any technical reviewer, and it opens in Excel or Google Sheets. It is a flat file of figures, not a financial model: there are no live formulas, and changing a cell does not recalculate the fair value.
Each scenario is a column. The file opens with a short statement that the figures are a separate comparator and not a basis of the company's accounts, then the currency and export date. The rows are:
| Row | Contents |
|---|---|
| Scenario and asset | The scenario name and the asset it is bound to |
| Status | "Matches committed" where the scenario has the same method and figure as the register's committed valuation for that asset, otherwise "Draft" |
| Method and fair value | The method used and the fair value it produced, with the currency |
| vs Base (%) | The difference from the first scenario in the file |
| Inputs | The main inputs, such as the royalty rate, discount rate, tax rate and projection period, listed for Relief from Royalty, MPEEM, Replacement Cost and With and Without |
| Contributory asset charges | For an MPEEM scenario, each charge on its own row, with a total |
A CFO values a brand twice, once at a royalty rate of 3% and once at 4%, and saves both as scenarios. The comparison CSV shows the two fair values in adjacent columns, the percentage difference from the first, and the royalty rate as the only input that differs. A reviewer can see what the royalty rate assumption is worth without opening the Asset Valuator.
Methods that have no input rows in the file (Cost Approach, Market Approach and Greenfield) still appear with their method and fair value. Their inputs are not listed.
It is worth being plain about what these outputs do not do, because both will be read by people who are not in the room when you explain them.
| Neither output is... | What that means for you |
|---|---|
| A signed valuation | Opagio is not a valuer. The PDF and the CSV report the figures in your saved scenarios. Where a valuation of record is needed, such as for M&A due diligence or financial reporting, a qualified professional should review the figures before anyone relies on them. |
| Self-updating | Both reflect the scenarios as they were when you generated the file. If an input changes, update the scenario, then generate the file again, and check the figures are current before you share them. |
| A compliance statement | A PDF that shows a method and a fair value is not a statement that the valuation complies with IFRS 3, ASC 805, IVS or any other standard. That is a valuer's or an auditor's judgement. |
| A substitute for your evidence | The royalty rate, the discount rate and the attrition rate are your assumptions. The Asset Valuator does not supply a royalty rate, and any default in a form is a starting point to replace with evidence. The evidence lives in your own records, and the PDF's evidence log lists what you have recorded against the register. |
A comparison CSV that shows two scenarios with different method labels is not a like-for-like comparison. A Relief from Royalty figure and a Replacement Cost figure answer different questions about the same asset. Read the method row before you read the fair value row.
The same saved scenarios feed both outputs, so the numbers agree. What changes is the framing.
| Audience | Report Studio Preset | What the Preset Includes |
|---|---|---|
| A board | Board | Dense and tabular: executive summary, KPIs, revenue, register, valuation summary, spend, lending readiness and the evidence appendix |
| Investors | Investors | Narrative and chart-led: executive summary, KPIs, revenue trend, register and valuation summary |
| A buyer's due-diligence team | Buyer due-diligence pack | A one-off, evidence-forward pack with the full register and the evidence log |
| A lender | Any preset with the lending readiness section switched on | The collateral-eligible assets on the register |
The comparison CSV is a useful companion in each case. It gives the finance director, or a buyer's technical reviewer, the scenarios behind the valuation summary and a record of what each one assumed.
You do not run a separate valuation for each audience. You save the scenarios once, then choose the output and the preset that suit the reader.
A growth-stage SaaS company is preparing for a Series B. The CFO has connected Xero to Opagio Intangibles and used the Asset Valuator to value the customer relationships with MPEEM, the brand with Relief from Royalty and the proprietary software with Replacement Cost. This example is illustrative.
| Step | What the CFO Does |
|---|---|
| 1. Save the scenarios | For each asset she saves the scenario she regards as her base case. For the brand she also saves a second scenario with a higher royalty rate, to see how much that assumption matters. |
| 2. Compare | On the Compare Scenarios page she selects up to four scenarios and exports the CSV. She reads the method row first, then the fair values, then the inputs, and checks the status row to see which scenarios match the register's committed valuations. |
| 3. Generate the PDF | She chooses the fundraise readiness preset in Report Studio, keeps the valuation summary, switches on the register summary and downloads the PDF. |
| 4. Review before sharing | She checks the figures against her own working papers and adds a sentence to the covering note saying the report is not a signed valuation. If investors want an independent view, she tells them it will come from a qualified valuer. |
| 5. Distribute | The PDF goes into the data room. The CSV goes into a sub-folder for the investor's technical reviewer, with the evidence for each input filed alongside it. |
The output does the formatting. The work that makes the numbers credible, the evidence behind each assumption, is the same work it was before.
Reporting is the visible output of The Opagio Method, but it is not a step on its own. A report is only as complete as the discovery behind it: it values what has been identified, and a reader cannot tell what was missed unless the register shows it. The Value Drivers Register summary in the PDF is where that becomes visible: it lists each asset with its status and value, and where some spend has been identified but not yet valued, it says so and states that figure at cost, not as a fair value.
The free Intangible Asset Valuator gives an indicative, firm-level estimate with no sign-up, which you can print from your browser for internal review and scoping. It does not run the asset-level methods or produce the Report Studio PDF and the scenario comparison CSV described here; those come from Opagio Intangibles.
For the exact limits of each export, see the FAQ on exporting an Opagio valuation. If you have a transaction or a reporting cycle in scope and want to discuss whether Opagio Intangibles is the right fit, contact the Opagio team for a complimentary scoping conversation.
Ivan Gowan is the CEO of Opagio. He previously spent 15 years at IG Group (LSE: IGG), where he was part of the senior leadership team during the company's growth from £300m to £2.7bn — a transformation driven overwhelmingly by intangible assets that traditional accounting did not capture. He holds an MSc in neural networks from the University of Edinburgh (2001).
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