Antonio Elinon Caratrel Consultants Pty Ltd

Agenda Enterprise Architecture (EA) to Business Intelligence (BI) to Accounting Intelligence (AI) Accounting Intelligence versus Business Intelligence Why Datamart4Excel Questions/Break Datamart4Excel Demonstration

Is Business Intelligence Part of Enterprise Architecture? Enterprise Architecture considers all systems that leverage the resources of EA BI, ERP, end-users, and accountants all interconnect through their usage of enterprise data Without architectural planning, these interconnections could easily fail – reflecting as a failure of EA itself There are ways to architecturally plan the interconnection between BI, accountants, and enterprise data

Business Intelligence is Here Has been around since DSS (decision support systems) and MIS (management information systems) Commonly used for competitive intelligencecompetitive intelligence Uses data gathered from a data warehouse or a data mart via ETL (extract-transform-load)data warehousedata mart ETL cost is typically 75%-80% of BI development

What is Accounting Intelligence A specialist form of business intelligencebusiness intelligence The general name for the set of technologies used to extract, analyse and present information from accounting and ERP applicationsERP Source:

Accounting Intelligence vs Business Intelligence AI - specifically designed to analyse data from specific ERP systems BI - more general tool that can be applied to any application that uses a database

Accounting Intelligence vs Business Intelligence AI - no staggering of data in a data warehouse or OLAP cubedata warehouseOLAP AI - extracted directly from the ERP at the time that a query is run (real-time) BI - typically involves a batch process to extract data from live source, and stored as denormalised via ETL (extract-transform-load)

Accounting Intelligence vs Business Intelligence AI – leverages the structure of the chart of accounts AI - dimension structures can be automatically created based on business unit hierarchies or any part of account code as stored in COA

Accounting Intelligence vs Business Intelligence AI – query means information returned is up to the second real time data AI - accounts can be corrected and a fresh trial balance viewed immediately AI – uses aggregation in accounting systems performed by the ERP when new journal entries are posted (no need for cube rebuild)

Accounting Intelligence vs Business Intelligence AI – no ETL therefore much simpler to install, implement and maintain AI - inquiries and reports typically created by end users rather than software developers

Accounting Intelligence vs Business Intelligence AI - no need to separately audit both the accounts themselves and separate data warehouse and ETL process AI – compliance easier for many companies – SOX, IFRS

Advantages of AI Ensures that an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system is the single source of all operational reporting and analysis Can be relied upon to give accurate and secure information Out of the box solution, much quicker to implement than BI

Advantages of AI No data warehouse, no staged data to audit Data returned in real time Data is not a snapshot of yesterday or last month

Some Disadvantages of AI Applied only to specific ERP systems, such as JDE, Oracle E-Business and SAP Cannot integrate data from outside the ERP system Datamart4Excel does not have these disadvantages!

Why Datamart4Excel The Problem of the Accountant Implications of the Problem The Solution

The Problem of the Accountant Under-powered data analysis capabilities in tool of choice Excel versus web-based solution Proliferation of tools for accountants Locking proprietary objects (formulas/buttons) in spreadsheets Difficult to transport and reuse reports Extending work flow process

Implications of the Problem Unable to use the full potential of Excel Excel and non-Excel toolsets Proliferation of Excel objects with proprietary links ROI on ERP spend Decrease in productivity Impact on functional work and ability to guide the business

The D4E Solution End-user tool that uses only options and menus already in Excel Providing data mart capabilities with unlimited filtering and unlimited combinations for data retrieval Workflow process unchanged

The D4E Solution Simplify access to data sources Provide easy-to-use but powerful parameter prompts Translate Excel actions to SQL commands to access data

Questions/Break

DEMONSTRATION

List of GL Transactions - Menu

List of GL Transactions – Parameter Prompts

List of GL Transactions - Results

Get GL Balances – Parameter Prompts

Get GL Balances – Results

Get GL Transactions with selected columns

Get GL Transactions with selected columns for Pivot reporting

Pivot Report of GL Transactions

Get GL Balances using Macro Script

Refresh User-Written Report

Refresh User-Written Reports via Script – multiple reports

Summary Full Data Mart capability for Accounting Intelligence Full use of Excel – high fidelity formatting possible Reports and spreadsheets are transportable with no proprietary formulas Only tool used is Excel Can be used to generate countless reports simultaneously

Questions