01
A project budget: where the overruns usually appear
The line items systematically underestimated in a first estimate — site setup, temporary utilities, design changes, price revisions — and the point in delivery at which each becomes visible.
Safe Guidance Investments Insights §05
Notes written out of live mandates.
Short pieces drawn from real mandates, project and commercial alike: decision criteria, verification procedures and the mistakes that repeat. No generalities.
Insights §05
§05.0
This section is in preparation. The topics in progress are listed below. Notification on publication can be requested through the contact form.
§05.01
Project, cost and contracts
02
What a technical manager checks at every statutory stage
What is actually inspected before the works move on, which documents are signed at that moment, and what follows from a stage accepted without a full check.
03
The construction contract: the clauses that decide who pays for delay
Deadlines, penalties, force majeure, price revision and handover. Who carries the risk under each variant, and what gets negotiated before signature rather than after.
§05.02
Market selection
01
Choosing a first export market when they all look possible
The criteria that rank a list of markets: size of demand, distance to the customer, the price level sustained, and what entry actually costs. And the order to apply them in.
02
Apparent demand and paying demand
Why import statistics can show an attractive market that will not, in practice, buy at your price — and how to test the difference before spending against it.
03
When the correct conclusion is not to enter
The signals that surface during research and justify stopping: insufficient margin, a protected local incumbent, certification requirements out of proportion to the opportunity.
§05.03
Partners and channels
01
Verifying a trading partner before the first delivery
What can be confirmed from public sources, what only a direct conversation confirms, and what cannot be confirmed at all — with the conclusion each of those supports.
02
Distributor, agent or direct sale
The three channel structures, the margin each demands, the control each leaves over the final price, and the commercial situation that justifies each.
03
Exclusivity asked for at the first meeting
Why it is asked for, what is lost by granting it too early, and the conditions that make it acceptable: volume thresholds, a fixed term, termination rights.
§05.04
Cost, delivery and compliance
01
Landed cost: what usually gets left out
The lines missing from a first estimate that change the conclusion: handling, intermediate storage, the cost of financing the goods, returns, currency spread.
02
Delivery terms and where responsibility passes
What each common delivery term means in practice for cost, for insurance, and for which party carries a delay or a loss.
03
Certification and approvals: the real timeline
Actual lead times by common category, what can be pursued in parallel with commercial negotiation, and what blocks delivery until it is complete.
§05.5
Contact
The first conversation carries no cost and no commitment.
Describe the project, the job or the market you have in mind. The reply includes a first read on the situation, the disciplines it involves and the stages proposed.