Generate UK M&A research, pitch decks and briefs from Slack using Anthropic and Google Docs/Slides

Description

Finance Research Analyst for Boutique M&A Agencies

This workflow acts as a junior finance research analyst for a UK boutique M&A or corporate finance team. It listens for Slack messages, classifies the request, gathers company or market data, and produces structured outputs in Google Docs, Google Slides, Google Sheets, and PostgreSQL.

It supports three user intents:

Research this company X
Prepare pitch materials for X
Industry briefing on vertical X

The workflow is designed for internal team use. It is not intended to send client-facing materials automatically without human review.

Why This Template
This template shows how a junior research analyst LIVE job and some of the key responsibilities might be automated with help of AI. 120+ junior analyst roles are live in London right now. This template does most of what they do.

What This Template Does

1. Company Research

When a user asks to research a company, the workflow:

searches Companies House for the best UK entity match
retrieves company profile, officers, and filing history
gathers company and website context using Firecrawl
retrieves public market quote data from Alpha Vantage when a ticker is available
asks an LLM to synthesize the research into a structured company profile
creates a Google Doc with the company profile
upserts the company into PostgreSQL
stores the generated research as reusable memory
updates the client database in Google Sheets
replies in the original Slack thread with the output link

2. Pitch Materials

When a user asks to prepare pitch materials, the workflow:

loads the stored company record from PostgreSQL
pulls the most recent stored research memory
asks an LLM to produce compact slide-ready bullet content
copies a Google Slides pitch template
replaces the template placeholders with generated content
creates a Google Doc press release draft
updates the pitch deck URL in PostgreSQL
updates the client database in Google Sheets
replies in the original Slack thread with the deck and document links

3. Industry Briefing

When a user asks for a sector briefing, the workflow:

gathers sector web and news context using Firecrawl
retrieves ONS macro M&A context
asks an LLM to generate a concise one-page industry briefing
creates a Google Doc with the briefing
replies in the original Slack thread with the document link

Who This Is For

This template is built for:

boutique M&A advisory firms
corporate finance teams
fundraising advisors
internal research analysts supporting pitch and origination work

It is optimized for UK company research because it relies on Companies House as the authoritative company registry.

Prerequisites

Before using this template, you need:

an n8n instance
a Slack app configured for message triggers and posting replies
a Google account with Drive, Docs, Slides, and Sheets access (Free)
a PostgreSQL database (Free self hosted or use supabase)
an OpenRouter credential for the LLM calls (Models used= haiku4.5, Sonnet 4.5)
a Companies House API key configured as Basic Auth (Free)
a Firecrawl API key configured as HTTP Header Auth (Free)
API key for Alpha Vantage (free)
fixed ONS URL for macro M&A context

Required n8n Credentials

Create or connect the following credentials in n8n before testing:

Slack Trigger credential for incoming Slack events
Slack credential for posting replies
OpenRouter API
Companies House Basic Auth
Firecrawl Header Auth
Google Drive OAuth2
Google Docs OAuth2
Google Slides OAuth2
Google Sheets OAuth2
Postgres

Required External Assets

1. Google Drive Root Folder

The workflow creates subfolders under a given root folder:

research outputs
pitch outputs
briefing outputs

Current root folder used in the workflow:

Modify this to your own folder: https://drive.google.com/drive/u/0/folders/1GH-YouAAImKugZ11IbqA6Ouw8B9U17-I

2. Google Sheets Client Database

The workflow writes to this spreadsheet:

Modify this to your own google sheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1yJ-UKOEUqIruCv-IBA33oN4taQTB1TA8M4a6D2iSiOU/edit?gid=0#gid=0

Required sheet name:

Sheet1

Required columns:

company_name
sector
companies_house_number
market_cap
last_researched
profile_doc_url
pitch_deck_url

Best practice:

make companies_house_number unique if possible
keep column names exactly as shown above

3. Google Slides Pitch Template

The workflow copies this Slides template:

1zQv_cbafHzd4JNsr711Rm0558O6W_S1SODc-u6tVS0k

Required placeholders in text boxes:

{company_name}
{sector}
{profile_summary}
{financials}
{opportunity_summary}
{comps_note}

Input Examples

Use messages like these in Slack:

Research Monzo, fintech
Prepare pitch for Wise
Industry briefing UK fintech

Outputs

Research Intent

Outputs:

Google Doc company profile
PostgreSQL company record update
PostgreSQL research memory insert
Google Sheets client DB update
Slack thread reply with doc link

Pitch Intent

Outputs:

copied and populated Google Slides deck
Google Doc press release draft
PostgreSQL pitch deck URL update
Google Sheets client DB update
Slack thread reply with deck and doc links

Brief Intent

Outputs:

Google Doc industry briefing
Slack thread reply with doc link

Database Expectations

This template expects PostgreSQL tables to exist for:

company records
research memory

At minimum, your database must support the queries used by the workflow for:

upserting company records
loading a company record by company_name
storing research memory
retrieving the latest research memory for pitch generation
updating pitch_deck_url

Limitations

UK company research is strongest because the workflow depends on Companies House.
private companies will not have public market quote data
public-company quote data comes from Alpha Vantage GLOBAL_QUOTE, which is not a true market-cap endpoint
the workflow does not create dynamic charts in Google Slides.
the workflow does not replace human judgment on valuation, comps, or client-facing strategy