SAP corporate finance management

• Are you realising the opportunities that technology can generate in your treasury?
• Does you treasury system provide your information requirements in a timely and complete manner?
• Does your investment in technology recognise the significance of this important “hub” of your treasury operation?
• Is your treasury solution closely integrated to the other business applications to deliver demonstrable benefits?

Your need

The pressures driving change within a treasury department are constantly increasing and as a result the requirement for systems to keep pace with the demands of treasury are also constantly increasing. Many corporations still maintain a proliferation of systems, spreadsheets and databases to meet the complex information needs of their Treasury. Inefficiencies and the lack of integration in these systems too often lead to incomplete and inconsistent information that hamper process improvements and value-added decision taking activities. For Treasurers to achieve optimum operation benefit from technology investment it is critical to maximise the integration.

SAP is one of the top providers for corporate-wide ERP solutions. It provides integrated solutions to multinational corporates throughout the world. Corporate Finance Management ("CFM") is the corporate treasury solution of SAP and offers a broad range of treasury functionality. SAP has heavily invested in its treasury functionality and now has a competitive product in the TMS space.

For those corporations that have/are implemented (-ing) SAP as their core ERP solution, SAP CFM offers a potential opportunity to integrate treasury systems into other business applications. CFM is one of the components of SAP that really exploits the power of ERP. With correct design and configuration, central treasury can have access to firm-wide financial data in real time, such as underlying transaction data for exposure management, cash forecasts and bank balances in addition to powerful transaction management functionality, consolidated reporting and risk management functions.

What we do?

The PricewaterhouseCoopers team is able to assist corporations by providing a combination of corporate treasury systems and programme management skills in the assessment and implementation of new technology in treasury. We develop and implement treasury systems solutions based on ERP and package applications.

Managing and integrating different underlying systems (with different versions on separate instances) into SAP CFM to provide the correct levels of integration requires strong project management and strong but flexible controls and methods. Our team uses a consistent methodology and has experience in large scale, global implementations.

PwC has developed a fast-track approach to implementation which utilises the experience we have developed in SAP CFM application development, as well as making use of our extensive library of database templates and configuration scripts.

Whilst remaining independent of all vendors PwC has established strong working relationships with ERP and package vendors. SAP recently granted the Belgian Office the status of preferred implementation partner for CFM in Belgium and Luxembourg.

Our methodology

PwC Corporate Treasury Solutions group has collated its experience on numerous SAP CFM and Treasury Management System implementations into a standard toolkit.
At a high level, the project is divided into seven different stages. PwC can be involved during the entire process, or focus on specific phases of the implementation:

• Evaluation: This is the preliminary phase, where the business strategy is formulated, feasibility studies and business cases are produced and benefits realisation identifies.
• Project preparation: At this stage the project goals and objectives are refined and the project scope developed. The overall project schedule and implementation strategy are defined and a detailed work-plan produced.
• Business Bueprint: Detailed documentation of the business process requirements is obtained through workshops, during which the "to-be" processes are designed and used to create the business blueprint. The technical design is also completed at this stage.
• Realisation: This phase uses prototyping techniques to produce a fully tested system that meets the requirements defined in the blueprint. The process is accelerated by making use of pre-configured templates where appropriate.
• Final preparation: In this phase the end-user training is conducted, user acceptance testing is completed and the production system administration is established. Data cleansing and harmonisation is completed and cut-over and production support plan are refined to be ready for go-live.
• Go-live: This phase runs from day 1 of going live, to a "system stable" production support environment. Finally, the completed project is closed, with a review and handover.
• Sustain: Post go-live activities includes: follow up training, long term process requirements plans, systems tuning, systems upgrade, archieving and systems operations. Finally a post implementation review is conducted and performance metrics monitored on a periodic basis.

The Benefits

The Corporate Treasury Solutions Group has established a leading position as implementation advisors for SAP's Treasury and CFM modules (TR-Cash Management, CFM-Transaction Manager, CFM-Market Risk Analyser, CFM-Credit Risk Analyser, CFM-In-House Cash) as well as Banking applications (Loans module).

SAP recently granted the Belgian office the status of sole preferred implementation partner for CFM in Belgium and Luxembourg. The Belgian Corporate Treasury Solutions Group has recently been involved in the following SAP CFM/TR projects:

• Implementation of SAP CFM for a UK based retail bank. This project covers the following modules: Transaction Manager, In-House Cash, Market Risk Analyser and Credit Risk Analyser.
• Implementation of SAP CFM for a leading manufacturer of high-quality chocolate and cocoa-related products. This project represented SAP's first CFM 2.0 implementation
• For an international service provider: Implementation of the SAP CFM modules (Foreign Exchange, Money Markets, Derivatives, Credit Risk Analyser and Market Risk Analyser).
• Our Belgian CFM team was invited by SAP to participate in the delta testing for the new FAS 133 functionality.
• Implementation of the SAP TR/CFM modules for a major multinational Energy company:
  • Cash Management, Treasury Management (Loans, Foreign Exchange, Money Markets, Derivatives) and Market Risk Management to support the internal bank activities of Group Treasury. This treasury system solution was developed in a highly complex environment (linking various SAP systems through ALE) and included a pilot configuration of the In-House Cash module as well.
  • Treasury Management to support the debt origination activities of Group Treasury. This project covered an advanced configuration of the Loans module in order to enable Group Treasury to deal with the group's bond issues in SAP.
  • Upgrade from SAP TR to SAP CFM 1.0.
  • Design of CFM 2.0 solution to support internal bank, debt management activities and other treasury operations
• Implementation of the SAP TR modules for a major European multinational in the automotive sector.
• Implementation of the SAP TR modules (Securities and Foreign Exchange) for a major multinational Chemical manufacturing company.

• We have assisted one of the largest tyre companies to implement the full suite of SAP-TR modules at the corporate headquarters in the USA. This work is part of broader project to centralise the treasury activities across this organisation.
• For a UK based FTSE 100 corporation: Implementation of Transaction Manager, In-House Cash, Market Risk Analyser and Credit Risk Analyser.
• We assisted an operating division in a major multinational based in Scandinavia to implement the SAP TR modules. In this project, we have assisted the client to implement a pilot version of the TR modules as part of a project to roll out the TR modules to other sites.
• For a major European retailer, implementation of Cash Management and streamlining of payments supported by SAP.
• We have assisted a major European insurance company in the establishment of pilot version of SAP TR as part of a project to roll out the TR modules to other sites.

In addition to the global partner initiatives between SAP and PwC, we maintain a unique relationship with the SAP CFM development team in Walldorf having been originally engaged by SAP to "gap" the product against best practice treasury standards. Our group is widely accepted as a thought leader in this area, and our team has been involved in developing and enhancing beta components of the system prior to go-live with clients as well as being invited to advanced partner updates and training workshops.

The team

PwC is the largest advisor to corporate treasurers, working for many of the top multinational corporations. Our presence in the market has led to our involvement in many of the largest SAP CFM system projects.
SAP Belux has chosen PwC Belgium as their preferred partner for SAP's CFM solution. This status recognises that PwC has achieved a remarkable knowledge, track of expertise and a number of qualified resources for CFM as well as tha fact that we have created visible, state-of-the-art client references.

We find that SAP CFM generally requires different set of complimentary skills to those of regular SAP implementations. For instance, building an accounting definition for an exotic barrier option according to FAS 133 or US GAAP requires deep accounting knowledge in addition to experienced configuration experts. A typical CFM rollout will also include mission critical interfaces for real-time financial data, confirmation matching, bank reporting and urgent payments. Our team of treasury consultants can supply both the treasury business knowledge and the necessary technical and application experts as required.

We recognise the importance of functional and technical expertise when taking on a complex, large inter-related system project like SAP CFM. PwC can deploy a balanced team of project management, treasury business, accounting and system related skills as required to suit the needs of the project.

Our Belgian team consists of over 10 Corporate Treasury specialists with a wide variety of expertise. Individual or joint team members have led or been heavily involved in all projects that we refer to in our credentials. Our project experience as well as continuous training efforts provide our team with the necessary in-depth knowledge and variety of skills to provide customised services on the most complex SAP CFM implementations.
Our Global Corporate Treasury Solutions group comprises of more than 150 professionals with practical corporate treasury, banking, technology, taxation, accounting and project management skills. We organise ourselves into five Centres of Excellence in Europe (Benelux, France, Switzerland, Germany, UK), the USA and Asia Pacific. The group operates as a single network and is experienced at providing services across regions.