In this second post, of a two-part blog post highlighting the Q&A session of a recent Perficient webinar, Orthofix Improves its Financial Close and Consolidations with Oracle Cloud (ARCS & FCCS), we learn a little bit more about the Orthofix environment and implementation.
Can you automate the load of GL data into Account Reconciliation Cloud Service?
Perficient – Yes, the load of GL data into ARCS can be automated. It can be done using a GL extract flat file and EPM Automate tool. If you have Oracle EPM 11.1.2.4 on-premises FDMEE then you can also automate direct GL loads from on-premises Oracle E-Business Suite to ARCS.
Is reporting done in Essbase or FCCS?
Perficient – FCCS is built on an Essbase technology, so when you’re reporting out of FCCS you are essentially reporting numbers out of Essbase which is the underlying database engine.
Do you have to implement the Consolidation portion of FCCS for Close Manager. Is ARCS a part of FCCS?
Perficient – Orthofix did not implement the consolidations portion of FCCS. They already do that in on-premises HFM. They were only leveraging FCCS to manage the close management functionality such as the tasks and the workflow associated around the work management process. They are not leveraging consolidations as part of the FCCS module. So the short answer is that you can implement just the Close Manager piece of FCCS.
Account Reconciliation Cloud Service is a separate licensed application.
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Is FDM on-premises or Cloud?
Perficient – In Orthofix’s case, it’s in both. They leverage on-premises FDMEE for the on-premises solution to load data into HFM. In the Cloud, you get a light functionality of FDM. It’s called Data Management. It is the mechanism to bring data into Oracle EPM Cloud applications. Orthofix uses Data Management to load data into ARCS.
How many ERP systems are mapped? How many foreign currencies?
Perficient – ERP systems are mapped. One is Oracle E-Business Suite (EBS) Release 12 and an older version, EBS Release 11, that has data for some companies. ARCS has a bunch of foreign currencies and the ones needed can be selected for use. Orthofix has about four or five foreign currencies setup in ARCS.
Does ACRS integrate with the FCM module? In other words, when a reconciliation is complete and the same rec is on the closing schedule, does it automatically close out on close schedule?
Perficient – You would not want to have ARCS reconciliations as part of an FCM module because typically you would have thousands of reconciliations. If you have each reconciliation as a task in FCM, managing FCM itself would be a huge responsibility. Having said that, you could have a task setup for each reconciliation but if you close a reconciliation in the ARCS, it is not automatically going to close the corresponding task in close manager.
Can you access the account reconciliation directly from the general ledger (drill down, function) or is access to the reconciliation separate?
Perficient – Account reconciliation cannot be accessed directly from EBS. There is drill back from the account reconciliation module, into EBS balances. Not from EBS to the account reconciliation module.
Was training documentation out of the box and if so, how much Perficient have to tailor to meet Orthofix instances?
Perficient – The test scripts that we used for testing the application were detailed enough. So we could use the content of those scripts for training too. As part of the implementation process, we did go through and actually use those as a basis for conducting training. Additionally, we provided documentation for administrators and users. The documents explained things like adding a user’s account to cloud, a walkthrough of how to get your ID, how to logon, how to use the application. For administrators, it explained how to load data, create periods, etc. These we typically provide as part of the implementation services.
How are you keeping the account dimension updated against your HFM app on ARCS? Do you have a different chart of accounts?
Orthofix – When we implemented R12, it became our global chart of accounts. HFM was built based on R12. We still have some subsidiaries that are still on 11i and a couple that are non-Oracle. They all end up reporting on the same chart of accounts. In Australia, we’re setting up their reconciliations according to R12 COA and the descriptions indicate the 11i segments. The accounts in ARCS are maintained using an upload template in excel.
Do they have plans to move to the Cloud consolidation module? If so, when?
Perficient – HFM was implemented in 2016 because the implementation started prior to FCCS being generally available for customers to purchase. My guess is that the next upgrade cycle for HFM might be the time that Orthofix considers taking HFM/FDM to the Cloud. Given that they just implemented and went live last year on HFM, that’s probably not a priority now.
If you missed part-one of this blog post series, it’s worth a quick read. There was tremendous interest in this topic resulting in a marathon Q&A session.
