Alviva is one of Africa’s largest providers of information and communication technology products and services. The group comprises focused operating subsidiaries that specialise in their unique product and service offerings.
The group’s primary activities include the sale of IT-, fibre- and solar-related products, provision of installation, distribution, supply chain, freight, marketing campaign and maintenance services, as well as equipment rental and provision of finance to customers.
The challenge
Prior to implementing Finnivo®, Alviva’s group finance function relied heavily on manual processes and Excel-based templates. Each month, teams would import roughly 35 trial balances from individual spreadsheets, manually collating and mapping data into a group Excel pack. This process often took over a week to complete and introduced significant room for human error, especially with junior staff responsible for intricate mappings.
“We wanted to start automating repetitive tasks to free up time at head office level,” explains, Chene Nienaber (CA) SA, Head of Reporting for Alviva. “Managing Excel consolidation manually was chaotic and extremely time-consuming. Finnivo® gave us a way to eliminate those inefficiencies.”
Adopting Finnivo®
Faced with the choice between Hyperion and Finnivo®, Alviva selected Finnivo® due to its lower cost, quick implementation, local support and ability to scale. A key success factor during adoption was the alignment of Finnivo®’s templates with Alviva’s existing group reporting structure, making it easy for the team to transition.
The implementation focused on getting the group chart of accounts (COA) right and mapping each subsidiary to the Finnivo® COA. “Our subsidiaries were already submitting Excel packs. This just formalised and streamlined the process,” says Nienaber. “Training was provided and adoption was smooth.”
Implementation and experience
The transition to Finnivo® was efficient and well received by the head office finance team. In addition to the consolidation functionality, the team now uses Finnivo® to automate financial statement notes (such as PPE disclosures) and generate board packs.
One of the most impactful features, says Nienaber, has been the ability to drill down into monthly results to analyse each subsidiary in more detail. Over time, the team began building extra reports directly into Finnivo®, further improving workflows.
“We now send our monthly reports to management at the click of a button,” she notes. “It used to take days of back-and-forth with Excel. What took a week is now done in moments.”
Achievements
Alviva has realised substantial time savings and operational efficiency through Finnivo®, with the automation of consolidation, flash reporting, budget process and covenant tracking freeing up resources and eliminating manual intervention.
The tool is also used for daily treasury reporting across the group, replacing a shared Excel file with a single, trusted source of financial data. “If the process was frustrating, we’d have heard about it,” says Nienaber. “The fact that we haven’t, tells us it’s working well.”
Looking ahead, Alviva plans to extend Finnivo® further, building templates for financial planning, budgeting and treasury, ensuring a fully integrated finance environment for future growth.