Polifin, manufacturer of polymers and monomers, has implemented Hyperion Essbase; the multi-dimensional analysis software supplied by Global Technology Business Intelligence (GBI), a division of Global Technology.
This, according to Andre Grobler, group management accountant, replaces an outdated, rigid system used to prepare and consolidate group accounts. "We wanted to change the ratio where 80 percent of our time was spent on account preparation and 20 percent on analysis, to 80 percent analysis. We have gone a long way to achieving this as our lead times have been considerably reduced, with a final consolidation of all our figures for year-end now only taking a couple of hours."
Polifin, a listed company, was established by Sasol and AECI and had a reported R3.7 billion turnover in the last financial year. It manufactures the materials used for producing plastic products and uses SAP as its enterprise resource planning (ERP) software. The sheer size of the enterprise meant that the old consolidation tool took weeks to prepare and consolidate the budgets and reports.
A number of solutions, including SAP consolidation and reporting, were researched. There were some unusual requirements, an example being a joint venture agreement specifying that 50 percent of the balance sheet and 60 percent of the income sheet has to be added together. "The real selling point for us was the flexibility of Hyperion Essbase," explains Grobler, "most of the other products had 90 percent of the needed functionality, but couldn`t deal with the unusual requirements and did not have the multi-dimensional analysis capabilities. Also, with Hyperion combining Essbase with its database containing built-in consolidation functionality and Hyperion`s front-end, we didn`t have to look for consolidation software as well."
A pilot project was run in October 1998. In April 1999, the software was installed in the finance section and training was done. "Polifin wanted to be able to run the system with minimal supplier support, and we made sure that there was a thorough knowledge transfer", says Annette Hieber, GBI account manager. It took two weeks to get the year-end templates ready and do the user training. The templates were sent to all the divisions, the figures were completed and entered into the model, and then consolidated.
"In the past I would have had to add another two weeks for testing and checking", says Grobler, "Hyperion Essbase made it possible to have audited results ready within one month after year-end."
Grobler sees the implementation of software as being necessarily preceded by a buy-in and commitment by those involved in using it, from top management to those working at the coalface. "One of the project`s primary functions is to educate all stakeholders", he says.
Future plans include the automation of the process of downloading, template dissemination and reloading completed data into the Hyperion Essbase model. "The consolidation can then be done overnight, giving us an opportunity to do further iterations if needed. This will allow us to spend more time doing analysis and concentrate on business issues."
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