An Interview with Rebekah Kasumu – Plug Capital Founder, CEO & CFO

For many emerging managers, the hardest part of building a fund is not strategy. It is infrastructure. Launching and operating a fund means navigating a web of providers: law firms, fund administrators, tax advisers, and regulatory structures, all sitting outside the business. For lean teams and first-time GPs, coordinating this ecosystem quickly becomes the work itself. It is a challenge the British Business Bank has recognised directly. Its newly launched Pathways Capital programme, a £400m initiative backing first-time solo GPs launching UK microfunds of between £5 million and £20 million, was designed specifically to address it. 

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We are proud to announce that bunch has been selected as one of three official service providers on the panel and Plug Capital joins as the designated regulatory host and fractional CFO partner.

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In a recent interview with Rebekah Kasumu, founder of Plug Capital and a finance leader with nearly two decades of experience in private markets, we discussed why this challenge continues to slow down emerging managers and why the embedded CFO model is becoming an increasingly important response.But the term can be misleading. "When people hear fractional CFO, they often think part-time finance support," Kasumu shared. "In reality, what emerging managers need is someone embedded in the business who understands how a fund works end-to-end."

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The rise of the fractional CFO is not simply about adding finance capacity. It reflects a deeper need: a way to connect fragmented infrastructure and bring operational and strategic decision-making closer together.

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The same questions keep coming up

Kasumu's perspective is shaped by nearly 18 years working across private markets, including senior finance roles at a FTSE-250 private equity fund and later at LocalGlobe. Working closely with first-time and emerging managers, she noticed the same questions surfacing repeatedly: where to domicile a fund, which administrators or tax advisers to work with, what market standard terms should look like, and how to structure the fund itself."Their edge is investing in great companies. Not navigating the complexities of LPAs and fund structuring."

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What many emerging managers lacked was not vision or access to deals, but access to operational expertise early enough in the process and without having to build a full internal finance or operations team. Wouter Gort, Partner at Hummingbird Ventures, captures what is at stake in bunch’s Emerging Fund Manager report: "To keep the trust high with LPs, you need transparent communication through both the highs and lows of your fund, and to show you have the infrastructure to execute on your promises." Infrastructure is not a footnote. It is often what separates the funds that close from the funds that do not.

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Whether you are setting up, operating, or scaling your fund, bunch's Emerging Fund Manager report delves into key industry trends, regulatory insights, and features two exclusive interviews with fund managers from top-performing VCs.

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The real problem: fragmentation

According to Kasumu, the biggest operational friction in private markets is not simply workload. It is fragmentation. Launching and managing a fund requires coordination across multiple providers, all operating outside the core team. Without a central operational layer, even straightforward decisions become time-consuming. Managers find themselves acting as the bridge between providers, translating information and coordinating conversations far outside their core focus.

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In one case Kasumu recalls, a GP estimated they were spending around 60% of their week on what they described as administration but what was effectively the infrastructure of the fund. Quarterly reporting still consumes disproportionate time because the infrastructure beneath it was not designed for scale. With the right operational support in place, she estimates managers can regain at least 20 hours per week. Time that can be redirected towards building LP relationships and identifying the next investment opportunity.

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What the embedded model changes in practice

This is where the embedded CFO model begins to make a difference and why Rebekah is launching Plug Capital together with Alex Soderman and Katherine Norris. Rather than acting as another external adviser, Plug Capital integrates directly into the operational flow of the fund and coordinates the provider ecosystem on behalf of the manager. One of the first steps is defining the commercial structure before engaging external providers."The first thing we do is create a heads of terms setting out the fund mechanics for the fund," Kasumu explains.

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Establishing these parameters early creates clarity for both managers and legal counsel, reducing the back-and-forth that often drives up legal costs. From there, Plug Capital either introduces managers to the right providers or steps into existing relationships. The operational stack follows: systems, bookkeeping, and entity incorporation that form the working infrastructure of the fund. Each step builds on the last, creating a coherent foundation rather than a patchwork of disconnected decisions.

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Where the value becomes strategic

The deeper value of the model emerges once operational infrastructure is stabilised and the CFO becomes embedded in strategic decision-making. A fund commitment is not simply capital waiting to be deployed. It must also support the operational life of the fund, including management fees, administration and other expenses. This means thinking carefully about how capital moves through the lifecycle of the fund.

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"In practice, this might mean setting aside a defined reserve ratio early, maybe 20 to 30 per cent, or maybe nothing at all, depending on your strategy," Kasumu explains. "The intent is to protect the fund's ability to support its best-performing companies in later rounds, and it sends strong signals to co-investors." It also means modelling when follow-on decisions are likely to arise relative to deployment pace, so capital is not committed too quickly in the early years. For managers approaching the end of a fund's life, recycling distributions from early exits can meaningfully extend deployment capacity without requiring additional LP capital.

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"People create fund models, but the real question is how that model comes to life in day-to-day decision making."At this stage, the CFO role moves far beyond financial oversight. It becomes part of shaping how the fund's strategy is executed in practice.

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Why operations matter even more by Fund II

Operational infrastructure becomes even more visible as managers raise subsequent funds. A first fund may tolerate a degree of scrappiness. By the time a manager begins raising fund two, expectations change. Investors want to see evidence that the firm is evolving into a durable platform. Institutional LPs often conduct detailed operational due diligence alongside investment evaluation, and operational concerns can delay or even halt an investment decision. Operational weaknesses are not simply inefficient. They can become a fundraising risk.

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What managers should look for in a fund admin

Selecting a fund administrator is one of the most consequential infrastructure decisions an emerging manager makes. For smaller funds, price sensitivity is understandable, but Kasumu believes the relationship should be treated as a long-term partnership rather than a short-term procurement exercise.

"We can't be in a world where NAVs are turned around 90 days after quarter end. Managers need access to what's happening in their portfolio much faster than that."

"The biggest risk in finance is human error. If processes are manual, mistakes happen. Automation helps reduce that risk."

Wouter Gort echoes this in the Emerging Fund Manager report: "A clean CRM, efficient workflows, and a centralised clean data hub for accurate reporting are key to having good infrastructure. Tools like bunch reduce the friction for emerging managers looking to get started."

Strong platforms combine technology with responsive human support when escalation is needed. This is precisely what shaped Plug Capital's decision to partner with bunch.

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How bunch works with Plug Capital

The roles are clearly defined. Plug Capital acts as FCA regulatory host and fractional CFO, providing the regulatory umbrella, embedding senior operational expertise into the fund from day one, and handling the finance and compliance work that most lean teams cannot absorb. bunch provides the technology layer: LP onboarding, capital calls, investor reporting, fund accounting and the system of record that holds it all together. Neither replaces the other. Together, they give emerging managers something that has historically been out of reach: institutional-grade infrastructure without an institutional-sized team.

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We work closely with bunch to have managers onboarded in a streamlined way, covering capital calls, investor reporting, annual audits and tax compliance. A technology-first fund administrator removes the manual coordination that would otherwise sit on the CFO's desk, allowing Plug Capital to stay focused on the decisions that shape how a fund performs. When the infrastructure runs cleanly, the real work becomes possible.

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Plug Capital & bunch on the British Business Bank's Pathways Capital panel

That model is now being put to work at scale. Pathways Capital commits up to 50 per cent of each fund as anchor LP, with up to 30 funds expected to launch across eight cohorts through to 2029. It is one of the most significant structural interventions in the UK emerging manager landscape in years, designed specifically to level the playing field for diverse and underrepresented fund managers who lack the institutional networks to raise a traditional VC fund.

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For funds accepted into the programme, the Plug Capital and bunch partnership means access to a fully integrated, ready-to-operate setup from day one: regulatory hosting, fund administration, LP onboarding, capital call processing, investor reporting and embedded CFO support, all coordinated through a single operational layer. The first cohort is expected to launch between April and June 2026. For first-time managers navigating their first close, that combination of regulatory cover, operational expertise and technology infrastructure is not a nice-to-have. It is what makes the difference between a fund that closes on time and one that does not.

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Get in touch to find out how we can support your fund from day one.

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About Rebekah Kasumu

Rebekah Kasumu is the founder of Plug Capital and a finance leader with nearly two decades of experience in private markets. She previously served as Head of Finance at a FTSE-250 private equity fund-of-funds, part of ICG, managing over $75 billion in assets. In 2021, she joined LocalGlobe, leading the firm's finance function as it managed around $2 billion in assets across multiple investment strategies. Today, through Plug Capital, she works with emerging managers as a fractional CFO, helping lean teams build the infrastructure needed to launch and scale their funds.

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