Customers

Recticel

"Business Objects solutions have enabled us to evolve towards a more detailed and faster management and statutory reporting process, as well as significantly improve data quality. This allows us to assess our performance with confidence and understanding."

Benoît Rottier, Deputy CFO, Recticel

Challenge

Brussels, Belgium-based Recticel is a chemical company that produces a wide variety of daily comfort-enhancing materials, including polyurethane foam filling for seats, mattresses, and slat bases, insulation material, interior comfort for cars, and an extensive range of industrial and domestic applications. With more than 100 business units in 26 countries, Recticel employs 11,300 people, and in 2005 generated annual sales of €1.39 billion.

Recticel must adhere to strict International Accounting Standards (IAS) regulations and has a constant need for up-to-date, accurate, and reliable information that management can use to make good decisions. However, Recticel was challenged with legacy statutory and management reporting systems that generated poor data quality at a painfully slow pace.

The aging reporting systems also created a lot of technical and maintenance problems. Lydia Van Buggenhout, group reporting analyst at Recticel, says, "The system’s outdated structure required a lot of manual and technical work. Adaptations at the local level and slow feedback by email resulted in poor data quality."

The company also needed to accelerate the consolidation process. Firmin Jonckheere, head of management reporting at Recticel, explains, "In theory, full reporting used to take 15 days—but 20 days was more realistic, plus another three or four days for consolidation. We considered ourselves lucky if we delivered management reporting on the 25th day." The company set a goal of reducing the monthly consolidation period from 25 days to 17 days, generating interim flash reports for management on day six after closing, and producing a full report on the 15th calendar day after close.

In addition to timelier reporting, Recticel aimed to improve the quality of its monthly and quarterly management reporting. Robert Wattecamps, assistant group accounting manager at Recticel, says, "Our data quality had to improve significantly." Along with that, notes Benoît Rottier, Deputy CFO at Recticel, "Statutory data had to be fully IAS compliant." Recticel decided to look for a solution that would enable it to streamline data collection, accelerate reporting, and centralize all information to ensure data consistency.

Approach

Following a detailed evaluation process of several leading vendors and their products, Recticel selected Business Objects, an SAP company, for its enterprise performance management solution. Recticel now uses the BusinessObjects™ Financial Consolidation application for statutory reporting, management reporting, consolidation, and budgeting. Some 85 reporting entities (each with several business units), working at over 30 different entry locations, currently use the Business Objects application. In addition, Recticel uses the BusinessObjects Intercompany application for the intercompany reconciliation process.

Results

Open and scalable, BusinessObjects Financial Consolidation gives users easy access to data via a standard web browser, and the data is available in a single database. Jonckheere says, "Thanks to BusinessObjects Financial Consolidation and the single platform it runs on, we are now gathering far more detailed data for reporting and consolidation than we did with our previous systems. Recticel management greatly appreciates the very timely results and rapid flash reports."

For Recticel, high-quality statutory and management reporting is vital for accurate decision-making and for retaining long-term market confidence. By deploying BusinessObjects Financial Consolidation in over 30 entry locations globally, and selecting BusinessObjects Intercompany, Recticel has streamlined its financial reporting and enhanced data quality. These improvements give Recticel staff more time for value-added activities and allow management to make faster and better-funded decisions.

Recticel now performs complete, reliable reconciliations on a frequent basis. Rottier comments, "External IAS regulations require regular reporting. With Business Objects, we have met this objective. In addition, we enjoy a better track record at audits." The new solution provides regular reliable reporting on a monthly, quarterly, half-year, and yearly basis, and consolidation is performed in a single step.

Jonckheere says, "The consolidated data is available much earlier than before. We’ve reduced reporting time from 20 to 15 days, and consolidated results are available on the 17th calendar day after close. Value-added tasks, like capital employed and cash flow reporting, can replace the extra time we used to spend before we implemented the Business Objects solutions."

Recticel plans to continue working at accelerating the consolidation process. "Recticel now wants to enhance the cash flow reporting linked to the quarterly capital employed reporting. Then we need to reduce the management reporting period by five days, and the IAS and board reporting period by several days, depending on the current local time frame," says Jonckheere. "More stringent Euronext reporting standards will take effect as well. We expect to have only two months to publish our results, instead of the three months we have now." The company also plans to extend its BusinessObjects Financial Consolidation application by implementing BusinessObjects Extended Analytics for statistical analysis, and enhancing the database. Jonckheere adds, "We hope to benefit from faster online inquiries and increased output customization. As a result, these future steps will enable us to enjoy an even shorter, more accurate reporting and consolidation process."

Smaller textLarger textPrint this page, properly formatted for paper

Quick Facts