From scattered Excels and data Silo’s to a unified Azure FP&A platform

A financial institution required an integrated solution to streamline their financial planning processes like budgeting, targeting, forecasting and strategic P&L & B/S planning. Previously, these processes relied on scattered Excel files, creating various risks and inefficiencies that had to be addressed. To overcome these challenges, the client sought a centralized platform that could optimize their planning functions, in such a way that it is easily adopted, covers the total enterprise and contributes trust and transparency in data quality.

Bibits stepped in to design and implement a tailored solution hosted on Microsoft Azure. It consolidates multiple applications and data sources into a single platform, and it became the single source of truth for financial- and commercial planning & analysis activities. An Azure SQL database with comprehensive data model and intuitive interface was created, which enabled real-time data management and reporting.

The team was confronted with several challenges before being successful:

1.     Holistic data model: An extensive data model, mappings, business logic, reference- and master-data had to be implemented to consolidate over 100 different sources into a single, unified data model.

2.     User Interface: Hundreds of users had to be able to maintain and review their data in real time, in a central location and with strict controls around data quality and security. The UI had to be intuitive, easy to delegate and flexible enough to adapt to changes in the annual FP&A process.

3.     Data Migration: Data had to be migrated from on-premises systems to the cloud while maintaining data integrity and compatibility with old tools.

Non-functional aspects that had to meet related to:

1.     Security and Compliance: Ensuring to adhere with companies demanding security and compliance standards

2.     Performance and Cost Optimization: Balancing Azure's performance with cost-efficiency to keep control over Azure costs.

Despite these hurdles, the platform was delivered, providing all means necessary to support effective FP&A processes, conform expectations and within the agreed timelines. The architecture allows for future expansion and contributes to improved data quality and overall operational effectiveness. As of today, the system evolved into a reliable hub to manage various data entry & enrichment activities driving the organization in pursuing and managing their strategy.