Moving Data within a Planning Application at Avago Technologies

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Moving Data within a Planning Application at
Avago Technologies

• Audrey HolifieldProject Manager, FPAAvago
  Technologies
• Patrick LouieDirectorHackett Technology
  Solutions

2
About Avago Technologies

• Leading global manufacturer of optoelectronics
  and analog interface components
• Former semiconductor business of Agilent
  Technologies
• 1.6B in annual revenue
• Primary Locations California and Singapore
• Primary Finance Locations California, Singapore
  and Malaysia

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About Hackett Technology Solutions

• Provide Professional Consulting Services for all
  of Oracles Hyperion suite of products
• Publicly traded on the NASDAQ (symbol ANSR)
• Formerly known as Answerthink
• 1 Hyperion Americas Reseller Award at Solutions
  2006 and 2007

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Agenda

• Introduction
• Main Considerations for Design
• Issue 1 Workforce Inputs
• Concerns
• Solution
• Issue 2 Functional Reporting
• Concerns
• Solution
• Closing
• QA

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Introduction

• Avago Technologies decided to implement a
  Hyperion Planning application to enhance the
  efficiency of its budgeting, forecasting, and
  financial reporting cycles for both the Income
  Statement and Balance Sheet.
• Three databases deployed at Avago
• Workforce (Employee level planning)
• FINSTMT (Annual Operating Plan at account,
  department and country level)
• FCST (Forecast and monthly reporting at summary
  level)

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Main Considerations for Design

• Performance
• Simple for users
• Supports user analysis and reporting needs

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Issue 1 Workforce Inputs

• Finance users making salary and benefits entries
  to the Workforce database
• Need to see the effects on the Income Statement
  in the FINSTMT database
• Waiting for scheduled batches to transfer data
  from Workforce to FINSTMT would slow down the
  planning process

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Concerns

• Scheduled batches would have to be broad in scope
  and would affect performance while the batch was
  in process
• Run-time prompts could lead to human error
• Users could forget to run scripts to transfer
  data, leading to expenses not populating in
  FINSTMT as expected

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Solutions

• Hyperion Business Rule that utilized the _at_XREF
  function to transfer data from Workforce to
  FINSTMT
• Using Variables in the HBR that could take the
  POV from the form so that only the members that
  were being written to were transferred the
  changes were then aggregated up in FINSTMT with
  the _at_ANCESTORS function
• HBR was set to run on save in the input form

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Workforce Input form with Business Rules
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Issue 2 Functional Reporting

• Operating expense accounts jointly used by all
  functions at Avago (i.e. people and project
  expense account numbers)
• Functions appear at in different sections of the
  Income Statement (i.e. RD is function 2,
  Marketing is function 4)
• Previous application used by Avago was set up for
  a unique account and function combinations, which
  created 5x number of expenses accounts (i.e.
  800001 FN1, 800001 FN2, etc.)
• Need an intuitive solution so users can easily
  enter expenses and have them appear in the
  correct section of the Income Statement without
  complicating the account structure

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Function breakout on Income Statement
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Concerns

• Having same accounts appear at different points
  on an Income Statement hierarchy could create
  duplicate data
• Relying on all users to use Account and Function
  combinations in reporting and analysis is
  cumbersome and risky
• Need database to correctly calculate the various
  subtotal values of the Income Statement (i.e.
  Cost of Sales, RD, Admin)

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Solution

• Create custom accounts dedicated to each function
  that could be placed at different points in the
  Income Statement hierarchy
• Create People Expenses, Project Expense and
  Absorption accounts specifically for each
  function

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Custom Functional Accounts
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Solution

• Create custom accounts dedicated to each function
  that could be placed at different points in the
  Income Statement hierarchy
• Create People Expenses, Project Expense and
  Absorption accounts specifically for each
  function
• Use member formulas to copy level 0 data for
  department and geography from each of the
  specific functions

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Custom Functional Account Member Formulas
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Solution

• Create custom accounts dedicated to each function
  that could be placed at different points in the
  Income Statement hierarchy
• Create People Expenses, Project Expense and
  Absorption accounts specifically for each
  function
• Use member formulas to copy level 0 data for
  department and geography from each of the
  specific functions
• As a maintenance and scaling compromise, detailed
  analysis on those expense accounts would be done
  at an Account/Function level

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Shared Accounts
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Closing

• Solutions were efficient to not slow down the
  planning process
• Users were not required to use a complex process
  to enter data
• Structure supports reporting requirements

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QA