Project Profile: International Entertainment Industry Utilizing JDE

Our client is a large family-owned corporation primarily focused on sports and entertainment industries, but are also involved with real estate, oil and gas, media, and a few other industries.  

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In early 2023, the client commenced a project to implement an Enterprise Performance Management (EPM) system for JDE and non-JDE entities. They were also looking for an Account Reconciliation tool (with an emphasis on Bank Reconciliation). They engaged ERP-One to lead the requirements gathering exercise with a diverse set of stakeholders in North America and Europe.  

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The client has been using JDE for over 20 years and have used ERP-One consulting services for various initiatives in recent years. The client engages in regular merger and acquisition (M&A) activity as well as regular divestitures. Within this M&A activity, the regular practice was to bring the new companies into JDE or, at minimum, load the monthly financial results for the new companies into JDE. From there, consolidated financial statements would be created using a variety of tools, where Microsoft Excel was the main tool. As the corporation continued to grow, the use of Excel became non-sustainable.  

In addition, several of the larger entertainment divisions had acquired EPM solutions to be used for Forecasting and Planning (FP&A). These systems were connected to JDE to receive data on actuals and budgets.  

Performing bank account reconciliations had been a pain point for many years, and the client was also looking for an Account Reconciliation solution that could also handle high-volume transaction matching as is required for Bank Account Reconciliation. The client was hoping to find a single tool that could meet all these requirements, which included Financial Consolidation, Financial Planning and Analysis (FP&A), Account Reconciliation, and reduce the requirement to feed non-JDE actuals data into JDE solely for the purpose of preparing consolidated financial results.  

While looking for an external partner to assist with the requirements, the client chose ERP-One Application Consulting services for a few reasons:

• We have a deep knowledge of JDE and could quickly understand their use of the JDE system and its potential impacts on the implementation of an EPM system

• We have a deep knowledge of integrations with JDE and have worked with a variety of EPM solutions for Consolidation and FP&A, as well as Bank Reconciliations  

• We are adept at running and facilitating Discovery and Requirements Gathering sessions with diverse groups  

• We brought an unbiased, solution-agnostic approach to the exercise.  

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By mid-2023, ERP-One had conducted 18 interviews with divisions in North America and Europe. Each group was asked a series of 30 free-form questions which stimulated discussion on their requirements but also allowed us to branch out into other directions if needed. The result was a 25-page requirements document which could be provided to the short-listed implementors for various software solutions. The implementors for several potential EPM solutions were asked to demonstrate their solutions based on the requirements and provide estimates for implementing according to those requirements.  

The client chose OneStream EPM as the solution and engaged another consulting firm as their implementor, and the project commenced in summer 2023. The consultants advised ERP-One that the requirements document had been extremely helpful and one of the most detailed, thorough, and constructive artifacts they’d been provided prior to starting an engagement. ERP-One remained engaged through the implementation of the first phase for Consolidations and provided guidance and assistance as needed.  

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In late 2023, ERP-One began requirements gathering for one of the client’s entertainment divisions for detailed Budgeting and FP&A. This division had a very tight schedule to implement this solution with OneStream in advance of their budgeting cycle, starting August 2024. While the external consulting firm’s team was fully engaged with the consolidation phase, ERP-One shifted focus to requirements gathering, stakeholder engagements, and detailed discussions and documentation with this division. Once the external consultant’s resources were able to switch to this next phase, they had the requirements defined in detail for them in a 25-page report.  

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“Our OneStream requirements gathering project was a huge win.  Our ERP-One consultant brought knowledge of both JDE and OneStream to the table allowing us to hand our OneStream implementation team a fully vetted requirements document.  I look forward to partnering with ERP-One on future projects.” – Director of Finance, The Client

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ERP-One continues to be engaged with this project as the client moves into subsequent phases. ERP-One offered our key strengths of deep JDE and accounting knowledge, excellent collaboration and communication skills, and attention to detail to this project.  

It has been very rewarding to engage with a wide variety of stakeholders and get to know their diverse and interesting business. It has been equally rewarding to work with a strong group of professionals both within the client organization and with another consulting firm offering solutions and services which so closely complement those that ERP-One excels at.  

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