Conglomerate deploying Plumtree-based HandySoft solution to meet Sarbanes-Oxley requirements
Vienna, VA — June 18, 2004 — Manufacturing conglomerate United Technologies Corp. is set to use a solution from software company HandySoft as its platform for ensuring Sarbanes-Oxley reporting compliance.
Hartford, Conn.-based UTC, number 51 on the Fortune 500, is a $31 billion corporation that provides high technology products to the aerospace and building industries worldwide. The company is planning to roll out HandySoft's SOXA Accelerator globally across its seven business units to help ensure compliance with the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.
Built as an inaugural application in Plumtree's Application Incubator program, the SOXA Accelerator combines business process management (BPM) capabilities from HandySoft with collaboration, content management, search and personalization from Plumtree. (The Sarbanes-Oxley Accelerator is offered as a stand-alone solution or as an add-on to existing HandySoft or Plumtree products.)
UTC and its business units — Pratt and Whitney, Hamilton Sundstrand, Sikorsky, Otis, Carrier, UTC Power and Chubb — have all deployed the Plumtree Enterprise Web Suite to serve customers, suppliers, partners and employees. "Since so many of our employees and business units are already familiar with our Enterprise Web environment, adding a comprehensive workflow and process application for our compliance requirements was a natural choice," said Chris Leigh, IT security manager at UTC.
HandySoft said that the SOXA Accelerator enables companies to leverage existing financial, enterprise resource planning (ERP) and other legacy systems to minimize the cost of compliance. It also provides the project and task management capabilities for defining significant accounts, processes, risks and internal controls that conform to the standards outlined in the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.
In addition, the SOXA Accelerator, built with Plumtree, provides such capabilities as enabling extended accounting, audit and compliance teams to have a personalized view of the compliance process and their assigned tasks; automating the gathering and centralization of documentation and evidence needed for compliance; and allowing secure collaboration between internal finance groups and external accounting agencies on documentation and processes.
HandySoft said that the solution also generates workflows for automating issue management and document sign-off; assists in identifying issues and improvement opportunities in auditing and internal control processes; helps ensure the integrity of records with audit trails, document management, version control and security measures; and provides real-time reports and continuous monitoring that deliver insights into the status and performance of controls.
"As a multinational company with more than 200,000 employees around the world, UTC understands that Sarbanes-Oxley is all about process management, tracking and enforcement, not as a one-time event, but on an ongoing basis," said Daryn Walters, vice president of global marketing and strategy for HandySoft. "That's exactly what the SOXA Accelerator will empower UTC to do."
Walters said that the UTC implementation would demonstrate that the HandySoft solution not only is suitable for smaller companies but also can scale to meet the needs of major conglomerates with thousands of users.
For more information on Sarbanes-Oxley, read Parts 1 and 2 of the recent SDCExec.com series on Contract Management: Five Myths of Contract Management, and Contract Management: Improving Corporate Governance.
Other recent SDCExec.com articles on Sarbanes-Oxley:
Survey: Most Companies Have Not Budgeted for Sarbanes-Oxley Compliance
Vienna, VA — June 18, 2004 — Manufacturing conglomerate United Technologies Corp. is set to use a solution from software company HandySoft as its platform for ensuring Sarbanes-Oxley reporting compliance.
Hartford, Conn.-based UTC, number 51 on the Fortune 500, is a $31 billion corporation that provides high technology products to the aerospace and building industries worldwide. The company is planning to roll out HandySoft's SOXA Accelerator globally across its seven business units to help ensure compliance with the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.
Built as an inaugural application in Plumtree's Application Incubator program, the SOXA Accelerator combines business process management (BPM) capabilities from HandySoft with collaboration, content management, search and personalization from Plumtree. (The Sarbanes-Oxley Accelerator is offered as a stand-alone solution or as an add-on to existing HandySoft or Plumtree products.)
UTC and its business units — Pratt and Whitney, Hamilton Sundstrand, Sikorsky, Otis, Carrier, UTC Power and Chubb — have all deployed the Plumtree Enterprise Web Suite to serve customers, suppliers, partners and employees. "Since so many of our employees and business units are already familiar with our Enterprise Web environment, adding a comprehensive workflow and process application for our compliance requirements was a natural choice," said Chris Leigh, IT security manager at UTC.
HandySoft said that the SOXA Accelerator enables companies to leverage existing financial, enterprise resource planning (ERP) and other legacy systems to minimize the cost of compliance. It also provides the project and task management capabilities for defining significant accounts, processes, risks and internal controls that conform to the standards outlined in the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.
In addition, the SOXA Accelerator, built with Plumtree, provides such capabilities as enabling extended accounting, audit and compliance teams to have a personalized view of the compliance process and their assigned tasks; automating the gathering and centralization of documentation and evidence needed for compliance; and allowing secure collaboration between internal finance groups and external accounting agencies on documentation and processes.
HandySoft said that the solution also generates workflows for automating issue management and document sign-off; assists in identifying issues and improvement opportunities in auditing and internal control processes; helps ensure the integrity of records with audit trails, document management, version control and security measures; and provides real-time reports and continuous monitoring that deliver insights into the status and performance of controls.
"As a multinational company with more than 200,000 employees around the world, UTC understands that Sarbanes-Oxley is all about process management, tracking and enforcement, not as a one-time event, but on an ongoing basis," said Daryn Walters, vice president of global marketing and strategy for HandySoft. "That's exactly what the SOXA Accelerator will empower UTC to do."
Walters said that the UTC implementation would demonstrate that the HandySoft solution not only is suitable for smaller companies but also can scale to meet the needs of major conglomerates with thousands of users.
For more information on Sarbanes-Oxley, read Parts 1 and 2 of the recent SDCExec.com series on Contract Management: Five Myths of Contract Management, and Contract Management: Improving Corporate Governance.
Other recent SDCExec.com articles on Sarbanes-Oxley:
- Synchronize to Survive
- Sarbanes-Oxley: The Next Y2K?
- Survey Reveals New Findings on Sarbanes-Oxley Compliance
- Most Companies Working on Sarbanes-Oxley
