Client & Context

The client is a privately held industrial manufacturer with approximately €600M in annual revenue and operations across Western and Central Europe. Growth through acquisition over the previous 5 years had created a fragmented systems landscape, with three different ERP platforms and highly variable local reporting practices.

The finance leadership team wanted to standardize consolidation, shorten the month‑end close, and gain better visibility into product and regional profitability. Their legacy consolidation process relied on Excel templates emailed between local finance teams and head office, with heavy manual checks and adjustments performed by a small group finance team. OneStream was selected as the strategic platform to unify consolidation, reporting, and future planning capabilities. The client engaged our firm as the implementation partner based on previous work in manufacturing and our experience with multi‑entity, multi‑ERP environments.

Challenges

Before OneStream, the month‑end close process was slow, error‑prone, and highly dependent on a few key individuals

Key challenges included:

• Long close cycle: The group close consistently took 10–12 working days,leaving minimal time for analysis before board reporting deadlines.
• Manual consolidation: Local entities submitted Excel files that had to be manually loaded, checked, and reconciled, consuming a large portion of the group finance team’s capacity.
• Multiple ERPs: Three different ERP systems produced data in inconsistent formats, resulting in repeated mapping and transformation efforts every month.
• Limited visibility: The CFO lacked timely, reliable views by product line and region, most analysis was performed ad hoc in spreadsheets outside the core process.
• Key-person risk: Two senior team members were central to running and troubleshooting consolidation, creating operational risk during busy periods or absences.

The client needed a solution that would reduce manual work, standardize the consolidation model, and provide a scalable foundation for future acquisitions, without disrupting ongoing statutory reporting.

Our Approach

The implementation was delivered in approximately 6 months, using a phased approach designed to minimize risk and build trust with local finance teams.

• Phase 1 – Design and Foundation (8 weeks):
  • Conducted a series of workshops with group and local finance to define the target consolidation model, chart of accounts, and reporting dimensions.
  • Analysed existing Excel templates and ERP outputs to design standardized data integration and mapping rules.
  • Agreed a pragmatic minimum viable scope focused on legal consolidation and core management reporting, with planning and advanced analytics reserved for later phases.

• Phase 2 – Build and Integration (10 weeks) :
  • Configured OneStream consolidation cubes to support multi‑entity, multi‑currency, and future acquisition scenarios.
  • Implemented data integration from the three ERP systems using standardized mapping tables and automated validation checks.
  • Recreated key management and statutory reports in OneStream, ensuring they matched existing Excel‑based outputs to maintain stakeholder confidence.

• Phase 3 – Parallel Run and Go‑Live (6 weeks) :
  • Ran three month‑end cycles in parallel: OneStream alongside the legacy excel process. Used differences during parallel runs to fine‑tune mapping rules, data quality checks, and local workflows.
  • Trained local finance teams and group users, focusing on data submission, validation, and standard reporting packs.

Results

The client needed a solution that would reduce manual work, standardize the consolidation model, and provide a scalable foundation form future acquisitions, without disrupting ongoing statutory reporting.
Quantitative outcomes:

• Close cycle : Reduced from 12 working days to approximately 5, freeing up an additional week for analysis and management discussions.
• Manual effort : Group finance estimates a 60% reduction in manual consolidation work, primarily through automated data loading, mapping, and validation.
• Error rate : Data corrections after submission dropped noticeably, with fewer last‑minute adjustments required before publishing results.
• Scalability : The model now handles 18 entities consistently and can accommodate new acquisitions with a repeatable onboarding process.

Qualitative outcomes:

• The CFO and group controller now receive a consistent set of reports directly from OneStream, improving confidence in the numbers.Local finance teams have clearer responsibilities and a standardized submission process, reducing back‑and‑forth communication at month‑end.
• Key‑person risk has decreased, as knowledge is embedded in the platform and process rather than in individual spreadsheets
• A senior finance stakeholder summarized the impact by noting that group discussions have shifted “from fixing numbers to understanding what the numbers are telling us.”

What’s Next?

With the consolidation and reporting foundation in place, the client has defined a roadmap to extend OneStream into additional areas:

• Rolling forecast and annual budget processes within the same platform
• More detailed profitability analysis by product and customer segment.
• Further automation of data integration as ERP upgrades are rolled out.

Our team continues to support the client through periodic health checks and performance optimization, ensuring the solution keeps pace with business and system changes.