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Company: Bright Food International Ltd, Hong Kong
Sector: Food and Beverages
When shoppers buy a bottle of Filippo Berio olive oil in Italy or Tnuva milk in Israel, they probably do not realise that these national brands are owned by Bright Food, a Chinese state enterprise. The group’s international food and beverages portfolio extends from Europe to Australia, and in future, it aims to harness its global distribution network to bring Bright Food products to more customers around the world.
Bright Food, based in Shanghai, faces the challenge of uniting diverse overseas management teams and workforces around the same corporate culture and mission in order to achieve its goal to become one of the world’s leading global food and beverages companies. In the past, Chinese state enterprises that have acquired foreign businesses have often struggled to overcome this hurdle. Instead, poor communication and a failure to understand the corporate cultures and business practices of overseas subsidiaries have often led to misunderstandings, confusion and even a total breakdown of trust.
Bright Food International (BFI), the Hong Kong-based subsidiary which manages the group’s global portfolio, was conscious of these issues when it engaged PwC in 2021 to develop a risk and regulatory management framework and solution. BFI wanted a people-led, technology-driven platform to help the group surmount internal language, culture and communication barriers, which had been reinforced by the COVID-19 pandemic and associated lockdowns. In addition, BFI needed the platform to satisfy increasingly stringent requirements by China’s state assets regulator for large companies to ensure transparency throughout their foreign holdings.
The solution in action: Digitalising BFI’s global risk management
PwC China’s risk and regulatory platform for BFI uses SAP’s latest agile, cloud-based and compatible business risk management technologies to deliver a complete overhaul of the company’s governance, risk and compliance (GRC) architecture. The platform is designed to balance domestic and international regulatory requirements with BFI’s specific global risk management needs.
To meet these goals, PwC China pioneered an integrated solution empowered by big data algorithms and applied statistical models to simulate and analyse behavioural traits. As a result, the platform both identifies risks across BFI’s global business operations and triggers alerts when potential deviations from trusted behavioural trends occur.
“Our platform for Bright Food International draws on PwC’s technology and industry expertise to help one of China’s leading food and beverages companies transform its global risk and regulatory management systems.”
At the platform’s heart, a hybrid risk management central data warehouse utilises SAP BW/4 Hana and Hana Database technology and displays the real-time results via SAP Analytics Cloud software. Design and development of the platform involved successful cooperation with professionals across PwC’s global network. For example, PwC Germany shared its deep technology knowledge of SAP Analytics Cloud and other SAP solutions that are installed on the platform. This collaboration enabled us to meet all the project’s goals, delivering the platform in phases, starting with the headquarters in Shanghai and subsidiaries in Hong Kong and Italy. Future phases are scheduled to connect more overseas BFI companies.
The human factor
PwC’s platform enables faster risk monitoring and alerts across BFI’s diverse global portfolio - for example, by eliminating many time-consuming manual reporting tasks, and by generating instant data and insights into current operations worldwide.
But the platform has a human dimension as well. With the global group’s internal communication in mind, we enabled leadership teams and managers at subsidiaries around the world to access the platform easily for business analytics. In addition, it enables international colleagues to share their regional and industry perspectives with the parent group. All of these exchanges are conducted in English, where previously the use of different languages on various national platforms formed a barrier to integrated, transparent global risk management and the development of a single worldwide corporate culture.
The outcome of this approach is already visible throughout BFI’s international network. Beyond its GRC functions, the platform serves as a global touch point where operational issues and business opportunities can be discussed as soon as they arise with senior management teams at foreign subsidiaries. At a lower level, the platform also acts as an information-sharing hub for managers at individual Bright Food companies around the world. Ultimately, customers also benefit from these interactions, which enable Bright Food to make, distribute and sell better products worldwide.
“PwC’s new platform has created more transparency and trust throughout Bright Food International’s Hong Kong and overseas networks. The platform allows us to operate more effectively as one worldwide organisation with the same strategic goals.”
Key takeaways: How Bright Food’s people and customers benefit from PwC’s risk transformation
- One week saved in management reporting time = more time gained to improve products
- Single risk reporting platform = integrated oversight of regional and national markets
- Worldwide sharing of local insights = using diversity to build a cohesive global culture
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Jennifer Ho
Asia Pacific, Mainland China & Hong Kong Risk Services Leader, PwC China
Tel: +852 2289 2919
Jasper Xu
Mainland China and Hong Kong Digital Trust & Risk Markets Leader, China Central Digital Trust & Risk Leader, PwC China
Tel: +[86] (21) 2323 3405
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Asia Pacific, Mainland China & Hong Kong Risk Services Leader, PwC Hong Kong
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