ABB Deploys Cadency® by Trintech for More Efficient Financial Processes

Blog post

In order to improve its Record to Report (R2R) process, ABB partnered with Trintech and Capgemini to implement Cadency® by Trintech in support of new processes, a drive for automation, and significant change management. After choosing to implement Cadency over BlackLine, ABB has achieved a single, standardized approach to balance sheet management on a global scale. Reconciliations have required less manual effort due to increased automation and the application of a risk-based strategy. ABB is now able to focus on the risk rating of their balance sheet, with high-risk accounts, such as bank accounts, being reconciled each month and with low risk accounts on a less frequent reconciliation cycle.

Let’s take a look at their financial transformation journey.

ABB’s Starting Point

ABB is a leading global engineering company, with 144,000 employees in over 100 countries, that energizes the transformation of society and industry to achieve a more productive, sustainable future. By connecting software to its electrification, robotics, automation and motion portfolio, ABB pushes the boundaries of technology to drive performance to new levels.

Before implementing Cadency, ABB’s goal was to standardize its record to report (R2R) processes, with a focus on balance sheet reconciliation, across all teams and regions in order to become more efficient and to be able to gain process and performance visibility across every business unit. Although the company previously used a single tool to manage balance sheet reconciliation, the actual ways of working varied among the 195 units in scope and across regions. ABB’s teams were each using their own methodology and reconciling accounts at different levels, making one global view of the process impossible. As a result, ABB decided to introduce a global and standardized approach to balance sheet management, thereby improving its own effectiveness and efficiency.

ABB Chose Cadency by Trintech

To help accomplish their goals and reduce the number of needed reconciliations, gain comprehensive visibility into the process, and introduce automation to reduce the amount of needed manual effort ABB decided to deploy the Cadency cloud solution globally. However, doing so required substantial technical expertise when it came to their ERP landscape. ABB decided to also work with a partner that could deliver upon its vision and help transform their diversified ERP setup with a single-core model.

ABB Partners with Trintech and Capgemini for Deployment

ABB partnered with Trintech and Capgemini to implement the Cadency platform for their Record to Report process as a way to globally manage a new set of processes, reduce manual tasks and gain global standardization. The partners began by defining the exact roles and responsibilities each organization would assume.

They decided that each would have a distinct and separate role, with ABB managing data gathering, user acceptance testing, tool maintenance after go-live, and change management; Trintech ensuring that the project fulfilled the original agreement and helping to resolve technical issues rapidly, and Capgemini responsible for the development and roll out of the Cadency solution. With this established, the partners planned and managed a workshop series with ABB business owners and IT teams. This provided Trintech and Capgemini with a thorough understanding of the challenges and needs unique to ABB. Based on this information, ABB, Trintech, and Capgemini began the design and development for the Cadency solution implementation.

Following this collaborative development period, the partners launched the Cadency solution, supported by a new set of policies that had been developed by ABB.

The Results

This project has demonstrated ABB’s commitment to innovation and self-improvement in all areas. The organization has realized new, more efficient ways of working with streamlined policies designed to fit the needs of its compliance framework. A new level of insight has now enabled ABB to guide behavior with live data to better manage its record-to-report process.

Based on the success of this project, the partners will continue to scale the solution and look into new opportunities to introduce automation to further improve ABB’s internal processes. All processes will be linked to ABB’s KPI dashboard using the new, live status provided by the Cadency deployment.

“The speed and success of the project came from being able to design new processes and policies, and then work jointly with Capgemini and Trintech to deploy and manage the new approach in Trintech’s Cadency platform, benefiting from this new, risk-enabled approach.”

Luca Condosta, Group Finance Process Owner R2R, ABB

Written by: Caleb Walter