The document discusses SAP Business Objects Planning and Consolidation for streamlined planning, budgeting, forecasting and financial close. It introduces Gary Obbes from IBM Financial Management Consulting Services and Les Smith from SAP Business Objects Centre of Excellence. The document also highlights gaps in finance effectiveness from an IBM CFO study and discusses the changed economic and technological environment requiring faster decisions, analysis and budgeting which exceeds spreadsheet limits. It notes industry trends in corporate performance management solutions.

1. SAP Business Objects Planning and Consolidation
Streamlined planning, budgeting, forecasting and fast, accurate close
Gary Obbes - IBM Financial Management Consulting Services Lead
Les Smith - SAP Business Objects Centre of Excellence
IBM Insight Forum 09 Make change work for you ®

2. IBM CFO Study highlights Finance effectiveness gaps
Performance
Measuring / monitoring business performance
Gap Insight
Aligning Finance with the Business
Gap Growth
Insight
Finance Continuous process improvement
Gap
Leading Finance related compliance programs &
strengthening internal controls
Risk
Meeting fiduciary and statutory requirements Insight
Supporting / managing enterprise risk
Areas of Importance 0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%
Effectiveness of Finance
“69 percent of Finance executives believe greater integration is difficult to execute,
but imperative to achieve.”
IBM, The Global CFO Study 2008
IBM Insight Forum 09 Make change work for you
®

3. The changed environment - economic and technological
 Volatility (Oil prices, Exchange rates, Raw material prices, Demand)
 The need for speed
 Faster decisions - Rolling Forecasts & Analysis
 Budgeting: Bottom 20% 90 days, Top performers 32 days - IBM Benchmarking data
 Spreadsheet limits
 Time, Error prone, Versions, Status, Linking
 Trends
 “CPM continues to be a major focus for the office of finance. The worsening economic
outlook is yet another driver increasing CPM suite adoption” - Gartner
 IBM - Cognos, SAP - Business Objects/Outlooksoft, Oracle - Hyperion
 Increased demands on Finance for better forecasting, budgeting, management reporting
and „what-if‟ analysis
Reasons are compelling - but the business case has been hard
IBM Insight Forum 09 Make change work for you
®

4. ATTENTION!
TRIAL LIMITATION - ONLY 3 SELECTED PAGES MAY BE CONVERTED PER
CONVERSION.
PURCHASING A LICENSE REMOVES THIS LIMITATION. TO DO SO, PLEASE USE THE
FOLLOWING LINK:
http://www.investintech.com/purchasea2e.html