Commercial Finance Lead (Co-pilot)

About This Role

This newly created leadership role heads finance for the entire business unit in Malaysia, owning the end-to-end financial picture including P&L, working capital, and balance sheet. The Commercial Finance Lead acts as a co-pilot to the business, challenging, advising, and solving problems as the company grows and integrates new acquisitions. It is a hands-on position for someone who enjoys being close to the business and thrives in a fast-moving, matrixed environment.

Responsibilities

• Act as the trusted finance partner to business and commercial leaders, working alongside them to drive growth and profitability
• Own end-to-end performance of the business unit: top line, costs, EBIT, and the impact of currency movements
• Analyse and challenge key areas such as pricing, customer and principal profitability, advertising and promotion spend, and cost development
• Support contract negotiations, investments, and strategic decisions with sound financial insight
• Lead target setting, annual budgeting, and forecasting with a focus on accuracy and accountability
• Prepare and present monthly business reviews and key insights to senior leadership
• Work closely with group finance counterparts to ensure consistent analysis and reporting standards
• Take ownership of working capital, including inventory, receivables, and payables, in partnership with the shared service centre
• Work with credit management, treasury, AR, AP, and tax teams to ensure sound cash and risk management
• Lead the finance side of acquisition integration, including onboarding people, vendors, and systems, and making sure data is accurate and reliable
• Liaise across business teams and the shared service centre to ensure a smooth transition
• Support strategic projects such as due diligence, restructuring, and future acquisitions
• Lead, coach, and develop, setting clear scope and priorities across the team
• Build finance business partnering capability and embed a culture of agility, accountability, and continuous improvement
• Drive process improvements and make better use of SAP and Power BI to improve efficiency and insight

Requirements

• Degree or professional qualification in Accounting or Finance (ACCA, CPA, CIMA, MIA or equivalent)
• At least 10 years

experience in a similar role, including 5 years in a managerial role

• Strong commercial finance background in industry
• Proven experience owning a P&L and working capital, ideally in trading, distribution, manufacturing or a similar business
• Exposure to M&A integration or rapid business change
• Hands-on with SAP
• Confident in engaging senior leadership and commercial teams, while comfortable getting into the detail