I watched this online yesterday and these are my notes. This was at Financials 2015 in Las Vegas, produced by SAP Insider.
SAP’s Thack Brown lead the keynote. He heads line of business finance which is “suite of solutions that help the corporate finance professional to do job better”. He is the former SAP CFO for Latin America
Figure 1: Source: SAP
Finance is under pressure, and forced to change
Every finance organization has to evolve to meet challenges
He said to leave for Las Vegas, he used Uber, Concur, Waze, all real time on cell phone, which allowed him to use predictive analytics, paid invoices wirelessly, checked bank balance
He said it was the 17th of month – could he tell if he met his numbers? He said they cannot wait until the end of the month
Finance has to rethink way operate, how get to real time in finance
Figure 2: Source: SAP
The “Future has arrived” SAP said, as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 3: Source: SAP
Today ad hoc reporting is needed in a matter of seconds
You need the ability to analyze questions on how to think
We live in a consumer world and want to interact in a dynamic way
Evolving targets at Finance, create information process and structures to support business analysis is challenging
A high priority is to look at underlying technology systems that are poorly integrated and we need to “react and respond to changes to market”
In 2008 we learned it “comes back to finance fundamentals – liquidity, receivables, controlling costs” with fierce competition, price pressure
Today we have a new level of complexity today to respond to challenging price pressure forces
Figure 4: Source: SAP
Figure 4 shows the results of an interactive poll.
First to the cloud was sales /CRM – in cloud; today with marketing – 60% decisions are cloud-based
Second wave is to the cloud is HCM Successfactors
Figure 5: Source: SAP
Finance is a complex migration to the cloud
Mergers and acquisitions are “back on the radar” with cloud solutions to help bridge 2 separate organizations
Figure 6: Source: SAP
Figure 6 shows “today’s reality” including usability, recruiting and retention
90% of executives are looking for greater ways to analyze data; looking for 1 source of the truth
Evolution of Office of Finance includes going from closing the books to becoming a strategic adviser
Finance has to support new mandates – often around data, analysis, and insight creation
Finance should also look for broader vision of how support business in business analysis
Figure 7: Source: SAP
S/4HANA is part of the perfect enterprise as shown in Figure 7 as a “real time entity, focus on customer and innovation, an ongoing objective”
SAP HANA a single data platform, single source of the truth, source of data across the enterprise, information is the most valuable asset you have
You work in a different way in real time
It is a native suite on top of HANA
Business Network including how to extend beyond company into providers
Ariba is B2B acquisition of suppliers, contracts, digital environment
Concur covers travel
Fieldglass helps contingent labor force
This is all paperless
Circque du Soleil uses Ariba, Concur, Business Suite, moving to Simple Finance
Figure 8: Source: SAP
Simple Finance helps remove some difficulties including reconciliation
Figure 9: Source: SAP
Figure 9 shows the financial roles that play in Simple Finance which is “real time”
Figure 10: Source: SAP
Real time in finance, using predictive to “think forward”
They showed a demo that “Will tell you best chart/KPI”
Figure 11: Source: SAP
Cash Manager uses Fiori, device independent
See the SAP video below
Closing Comments
Celina Rogers, panelist said the evolution of finance to a more strategic function, turn finance into organization that looks forward
Technology can support aspiration, a promise for finance
The other panelist Bill (didn't get last name) said if think of moving to new solutions, don’t do it for the money; execs talk about agility; security is an important issue; will be better in cloud than on premise, mind the gaps - get quick hits
Reference
Customer Journey Map http://simplefinance.sapjourneymap.com/
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