Provides early warning system for CFOs, identifies operational trends that affect financial results
Palo Alto, CA, and New York — November 7, 2003 — SeeCommerce, a provider of supply chain performance management (SCPM) applications, and KPMG, a U.S. audit and tax firm, today announced SeeRisk, a new enterprise performance management (EPM) package.
The companies said SeeRisk combines KPMG's operations risk management and financial reporting with SeeCommerce's performance management software and methodology so companies can identify operational issues, assess their impact on financial reporting and take corrective action.
They also said the software does such things as monitor internal controls, quantify the impact of actions taken to mitigate operational and financial risks and respond to market opportunities.
SeeRisk consists of an operations assessment conducted by KPMG to uncover areas of operational risk within an organization, and performance management applications from SeeCommerce to help identify and resolve supply chain and operational issues. The SeeRisk operations assessment focuses on risk mitigation and operating performance improvement. The SeeRisk performance management system is configured to each user by targeting specific business processes, and their interrelationships, across the supply chain.
"Operations drive financial performance. Therefore, every business and operational decision carries with it a certain inherent amount of risk that can affect a company's bottom line," said John Rittenhouse, managing director of KPMG LLP's National Operations Risk Management services. "Decisions that once meant a revenue shortfall can now pose significant financial hazards for a company. SeeRisk can help senior executives understand the impact of their operational decisions, in turn allowing companies to remain nimble and competitive."
The companies explained that SeeRisk provides correlative analytics, immediate notification and visibility to resolve operational issues before they adversely impact business performance.
For example, SeeRisk would alert a mobile phone manufacturer if the return rate of a new model exceeds pre-set thresholds. If, upon investigation, the company discovers the phones have a faulty component, SeeRisk will correlate the financial impact of the problem. Using analytics and performance data collected from operations systems, SeeRisk calculates the implications this defective component will have on revenues, operating costs (for the recall of defective phones, as well as the re-manufacturing, testing, and re-distribution of new phones), market share, and ultimately corporate profitability.
In addition, SeeRisk provides operations decision makers inside and outside (suppliers) the company with the information and collaboration tools required to accelerate problem resolution. The providers said SeeRisk would enable the company to short-circuit this operational issue and make the required financial adjustments, such as fine tuning cash reserves and revenue recognition, to avoid cash-flow short falls in the future. Without SeeRisk, it might take the manufacturer one or more reporting periods to fully assess the financial damage associated with the defective component.
"Risk management, often thought of as the province of specialists in the Financial Services and Energy sectors, is now a major factor in implementing an enterprise performance management (EPM) framework," said John Hagerty, vice president of research for leading business and technology advisory firm AMR Research, in an AMR Research Alert. "SeeRisk provides this link to allow executives to connect the dots between different silos of business data."
