"Are You Ready for the Revolution?"

Some global corporations are closing and consolidating their books in 1 day, making their organizations more agile, efficient and competitive. Are you ready for this corporate reporting revolution?

Large, multi-national corporations in the US like Cisco, Motorola and Dell are telling us they have achieved the "Holy Grail" for the corporate centre finance function, the "virtual close". This means, that they have established global reporting processes and systems that are so automated, integrated and standardised that they can close and consolidate their global books in hours not days.

The value of a "virtual close"? Immense, according to those who have done it. The cost of producing the information has been driven down and the value of the more timely data driven up.

Many others aspire to the "virtual close" but feel the complexities of their diverse, multi-divisional and multi-country businesses make such an aspiration an impossible dream. They are, however, seeking improvements in all aspects of their corporate reporting as the key performance indicator for the effectiveness of the corporate centre becomes the "speed of the close". Using this indicator, they feel that they can drive their global finance function to optimise all aspects of their reporting processes and systems. After all, a "fast close" will only be a value-added close if it results in:

• Better quality, more relevant and transparent data which results in a better understanding of the business;
• A "right first time" attitude in the processing of underlying transactions;
• A lower cost, industrialised, standardised and highly automated set of reporting systems and processes;
• An awareness that the close is a key business process but, as its data is historic and backward looking, its value is limited;
• A gain in the time spent analysing results and predicting the future.

The PricewaterhouseCoopers European Group Reporting Survey 2001

To help understand the current European picture, PricewaterhouseCoopers has just conducted an extensive survey, with over 100 European headquartered multi-national corporations. It covers topics such as timetables for reporting, data content, reporting processes, planning and forecasting processes and reporting systems. This data is complemented by a similar survey of 150 Fortune 500 companies carried out by PricewaterhouseCoopers in the USA three years ago. The majority of the survey participants are large corporations. Many are members of the Financial Times European Top 500, 71% with sales revenues in excess of 2 billion Euros and 51% with more than 75 reporting entities worldwide. PricewaterhouseCoopers European Enterprise Group Reporting Services team will be publishing much more detailed analysis and results from the survey over the next few months. So are you ready for the revolution?

Find out more

Drawing on the talents of more than 155,000 people in 150 countries, PricewaterhouseCoopers provides a full range of business advisory services to leading global, national and local companies and to public institutions. These services include audit, accounting and tax advice; management, information technology and human resource consulting; financial advisory services including mergers & acquisitions, business recovery, project finance and litigation support; business process outsourcing; and legal services through a global network of affiliated law firms.

PricewaterhouseCoopers Enterprise Group Reporting Services comprises a global network of over 300 specialist consulting staff, who work with the world's leading organisations to deliver successful group reporting projects encompassing strategy, process and implementation.

If you would like to find out more do not hesitate to contact James Fisher at

Southwark Towers, Level 20
32 London Bridge Street
London
SE1 9SY
james.a.fisher@uk.pwcglobal.com

Tel: 020 7213 2265
Fax: 020 7378 0647

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