Scandlines

Organisational changes that spawn more legal entities will inevitably result in added complexity and equally complex demands for budget planning, reporting and consolidation. Add to this the fact that the previous systems used for reporting was, to put it mildly, out of date and you might soon find your organisation in dire need for a unified solution that meet the requirements of today’s businesses and regulators.

Assisted by Affecto, the Danish/German shipping company Scandlines have had just that. More precisely, Scandlines chose Affecto to implement SAP Business Planning and Consolidation (BPC) to facilitate a smooth, streamlined reporting and consolidation process.

Vulnerable and lacking transparency

According to Scandlines’ Chief Financial Officer, Tage Reinert, a new system was long overdue: “We were running on and old, proprietary system based on spreadsheets and a Microsoft Access database. Everything was largely maintained and operated by one single employee, and our level of data security and data discipline were not quite up to par. Needless to say we were quite vulnerable.”

“Another problem was the lack of transparency. We had different sets of numbers from our business units - ferry lines, restaurants and retail - and we did not have what you might call one single truth. That is a huge problem when you need to constantly monitor and report earnings".

“So when we underwent a major restructuring of the organisation with more legal entities and added complexity,
it made perfect sense to look for a completely new system - and the right partner to deliver."

Scandlines picked Affecto in July 2010 and implementation was finalised on time, six months later, complete with Scandlines’ client-specific business processes built into the system by Affecto’s consultants.

Choosing SAP BPC was obvious as Scandlines was already using SAP ERP. With SAP BPC the Financial
Intelligence data integrates seamlessly with the ERP-system, providing Scandlines’ management with business critical information.

Looking though the same window

Tage Reinert points out three major advantages that Scandlines have attained with SAP BPC: “We now have one single truth in common - as opposed to before where the numbers might be debatable, depending on who was looking at those numbers. Now, we all look through the same window.”

“Secondly, we see a lot more when we look through that window. It allows for deeper and better analysis, reporting and consolidation. It also makes it easier to anchor responsibility in the organisation.” “And last, but not least, we have a nice and slick architecture. It all runs in SAP.”

Scandlines currently have about 30 users on the system, but Tage Reinert expect that number to increase to 50 as SAP BPC is rolled out deeper and wider across the organisation.