President of Global Capital Markets, Donnelley Financial Soltns
Search every verified Craig Clay interview, podcast appearance, and on-the-record quote — each transcript cross-checked by AI and human review to confirm speaker identity. Craig Clay, President of Global Capital Markets at Donnelley Financial Solutions (DFIN), has discussed the company's transformation from a financial printing business into a technology and software provider. In interviews, Clay stated that DFIN's spin-out from RR Donnelley in 2016 allowed the company to accelerate investment in software products, including Active Disclosure, a cloud-based financial reporting tool, and Venue, a virtual data room with built-in AI analytics. He described the company's focus on recurring revenue and security, noting that DFIN has implemented multi-factor authentication, encryption, and Type 2 SOC audits across its products. Clay has commented on market trends, stating that SPACs "rescued Wall Street from the COVID doldrums of 2020" and that they have "democratized access to late-stage venture companies" for individual investors. He expressed support for SEC scrutiny of SPACs, calling it "great because it means that the SEC is legitimizing and bringing confidence and transparency." Regarding the workplace, Clay said DFIN is "permanent work from home" and emphasized the importance of empathy and connection in combating the "great resignation," stating that "people work for people" and want to "feel valued." He also described the COVID-19 crisis as a "defining moment" that confirmed DFIN's transformation had succeeded.
“We were really excited to spin out of RR Donnelley to be a standalone company with no association back to the parent and really to accelerate and double down our investment which is helping again the same clients through their entire business life cycle from startup to initial fundraising to public listings to mergers...”
“Our product called Active Disclosure really allows companies to iterate and create an IPO and bring in an amazing amount of detail and working groups with multiple auditors, lawyers, underwriters all converging in this document with permissions, iteration, accept and reject features, connecting the financials to their...”
“We have an AI tool called Deal Maker that helps with post-merger integration by analyzing documents housed in virtual data rooms, assisting with HR, contracts, leases, and financial work, learning user preferences to provide targeted insights, and ensuring data security and privacy compliance like GDPR.”
“We are pushing security to the forefront with multi-factor authentication, watermarking, Type 2 SOC audits, born-in-the-cloud technology, anti-malware, encryption, and firewalls, making security a competitive advantage across all our products.”
“We acquire great technology by listening to clients, partnering, co-selling, and then integrating the technology quickly to make it accessible to clients either as standalone products or features within our platform.”
“ESG has become a very popular topic; our software and advisory services help clients understand regulations in Europe and proposed SEC regulations, identify their top ESG initiatives, compare to peers, and create fact sheets to lead in ESG transparency and compliance.”
“There is legislation like the Financial Transparency Act focused on good governance and transparency, requiring companies and governments to report spending, which would be publicly accessible; Steve Ballmer has done work in this area publishing 'America's 10K' using our Active Disclosure software.”
“Given our history, it's important to bring in diversity of thought and integrate that with the legacy organization to create a culture that is transformative, not disavowing the past but pushing forward with new ideas and technologies.”
“Artificial intelligence is not replacing people but replacing rote tasks, making people more efficient and effective, allowing them to focus on the knowledge part of their work.”
“The COVID-19 crisis was a defining moment where we realized the transformation to technology and recurring revenue products had worked, and despite the challenges, we delivered something extraordinary and are excited about the future.”
“We bought our largest competitor Bound during the financial crisis and then most recently in 2016 we spun out as a standalone public company where we're really focused on being a software company on turning our legacy long legacy into software products across a number of business opportunities and governance risk compl...”
“I think from a career perspective it's to step into the biggest problem areas to be on the lookout for things that are transformative. I had a number of opportunities because I stepped into things that others saw as problems whereas they almost always are opportunity.”
“Answering email is not work. It's really easy to get wrapped into all of the current things that are put on your plate, but that isn't what's transformational.”
“We as a company are permanent work from home. What does that mean? It means that last year we started to be together again with a cadence of meetings, not just Zoom but in person leadership meetings. It's an opportunity to do both, to meet people where they're at.”
“People work for people. They want to feel valued, they want to feel transparent, they have a way that they can measure their success. That is the most important thing in combating the great resignation.”
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