Anaplan Explained: Consolidation, Disclosure Management and Excel Reporting

Unlock the Full Suite of Anaplan Financial Consolidation & Reporting Solutions

Anaplan Financial Solutions offer a powerful platform designed to streamline and unify key financial activities-from Financial Consolidation and Disclosure Management to advanced Excel-based Financial Reporting. Anaplan delivers the agility and insight that organizations’ Finance teams need to drive efficiency and stay ahead of any and all financial hiccups.

This guide outlines the core components of Anaplan’s Financial Consolidation & Reporting solutions:

  • Financial Consolidation, 
  • Disclosure Management, and 
  • Excel Reporting,

while offering insight into how these solutions can revolutionize an organization’s Financial Planning and Reporting processes.

Snapshot: Anaplan Financial Consolidation & Reporting Capabilities

Take a look at Anaplan’s Financial Consolidation & Reporting capabilities in the illustration below: 

Image redesign inspired by: Anaplan 

Financial Consolidation, Simplified with Anaplan IFRS Accelerator 

For Finance teams operating across multiple entities, currencies and jurisdictions, meeting International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) can be a complex and time-intensive task. Traditional legacy systems often fall short in handling intercompany eliminations, equity variations and internal gains/losses, leading to delays, manual workarounds and increased compliance risks. 

Anaplan offers a powerful solution to this problem: IFRS Accelerator for Consolidation.

Anaplan’s IFRS Accelerator is designed to help Finance and Accounting teams quickly and confidently comply with IFRS requirements. It provides a standardised, repeatable and auditable process for data collection, consolidation and reporting, all while integrating with your existing systems.

Anaplan’s IFRS Accelerator: Key Benefits

Anaplan's IFRS Accelerator helps organizations save time and reduce risk by automating complex and time-consuming tasks. The key benefits of Anaplan’s IFRS Accelerator include:

  • Streamlined Processes: It automates the elimination of shares, internal dividends, intercompany provisions, and other complex transactions, which significantly simplifies the consolidation and reporting process.
  • Reduced Risk & Effort: The preconfigured logic and automated calculations minimize manual errors and free up your team to focus on more strategic, high-value activities.
  • Enhanced Auditability: The solution provides complete transparency and a clear audit trail that tracks data from the general ledger through to the final consolidated reports.

Anaplan’s Disclosure Management Solution: Discover the Insights Behind the Numbers

In today's fast-paced business world, Finance teams need to tell the story behind their numbers with both speed and confidence. Yet, many still struggle with the errors, risks and inefficiencies that plague statutory reporting processes, from annual reports to annual filings. These teams often find themselves buried in endless email chains, proofreading marathons and a dizzying array of competing document versions.

This is where Anaplan's Disclosure Management application comes in. 

It's a next-generation solution that goes beyond simply meeting statutory reporting requirements. The platform enables companies to swiftly and confidently produce high-quality reports for all internal and external stakeholders.

Anaplan's Disclosure Management: Key Benefits

Anaplan's Disclosure Management solution is designed to meet the evolving needs of the Office of Finance by facilitating effortless report generation within the familiar Microsoft Office environment. 

By leveraging a company's existing architecture, software and data, the platform allows for a rapid setup. The result? Teams can produce annual reports, statutory filings, board books and investor decks in a fraction of the time while ensuring accuracy and compliance.

The core benefits of Anaplan’s Disclosure Management application include:

  • Transformed Reporting: Companies can drastically reduce reporting time, achieving 100% accuracy and integrity in their financial data.
  • Guaranteed Compliance: The platform ensures full compliance with a wide range of regulations, including those from the SEC, ESEF and other agencies.
  • Business-Owned Control: Finance teams can take full control of the reporting process without needing IT support, all within an intuitive Office environment.
  • Rapid Deployment: The solution offers accelerated value, with the ability to go live in as little as two weeks and set up in just two hours.

Anaplan's Disclosure Management application is more than just an out-of-the-box solution; it's a comprehensive platform for modern narrative reporting. It automates the production and distribution of any internal or external report, with features that improve the entire reporting experience. The application offers users the following capabilities:

  • Data Source Integration: Integrate multiple data sources, including financial, operational and external data.
  • Narrative Reporting: Incorporate various narrative text components like management letters and notes to financial statements.
  • Real-time Collaboration: Enable multiple contributors, from auditors to executives, to collaborate actively on reports.
  • Reporting Compliance: Address different reporting requirements for various entities, regions or accounting standards (e.g., GAAP, IFRS, country-specific compliance).

Anaplan is committed to providing a secure and compliant platform for all its users. The Disclosure Management application has undergone extensive third-party audits and meets several key security and compliance standards:

  • SOC 1 Type II and SOC 2 Type II: An attested third-party auditor has verified Anaplan’s controls related to security, availability, processing integrity, confidentiality, and privacy.
  • GDPR: The application is fully compliant with the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), protecting users' fundamental rights to privacy and personal data.
  • Microsoft Azure: The application operates solely within Microsoft Azure data centers, which hold certifications like ISO 27001 and PCI/DSS Service Provider Level 1. European customers' data is hosted in EU-based data centers as required.
  • Advanced Authentication: To prevent Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF), Anaplan uses a highly secure session-ID tracking mechanism. It also supports access through two-factor authentication via Azure Active Directory or Federated Authentication for Single Sign-On (SSO).
  • Data Integrity and Availability: Customer data is continuously backed up and can be restored to the minute. In the event of a regional failure, data is automatically restored in a geographically distant data center. Anaplan also guarantees a 99.5% uptime SLA by leveraging Microsoft Azure Cloud.

Anaplan XL Reporting: Supercharge Your Reporting and Ad-Hoc Analysis

In today's fast-paced business world, Finance teams are expected to operate with agility, but they often face significant challenges. Complex business structures, outdated processes, and a tangle of fragmented systems can lead to misaligned and inaccurate reporting. This environment makes it difficult to keep up with evolving market trends and organizational needs.

Anaplan XL Reporting gives Finance the power of live data in Excel - enabling ad hoc analysis, board packs and dashboards without IT support. Designed for the demands of the modern Finance professional, this tool extends data-connected Excel, providing the flexibility and capabilities needed for insightful, interactive analysis and reports.

Anaplan XL Reporting: Key Benefits

Anaplan XL Reporting provides a faster, more flexible, and intuitive way to manage financial data, empowering teams to create comprehensive dashboards and reports with ease.

  • Accelerated Reporting: As a finance-owned, no-code solution, Anaplan XL Reporting empowers teams with self-service capabilities for analysis and reporting, enabling them to meet tight deadlines without needing IT support.
  • Real-Time, Unified View: The platform seamlessly connects to multiple data sources, providing real-time access to critical financial data. With over 30 built-in data connectors and bi-directional data flow, it increases reporting accuracy and drives better decision-making.
  • Enhanced Control and Governance: Finance teams can confidently slice, dice, and drill into data while ensuring the necessary IT governance and control.
  • Clearer Insights, Less Effort: Users can leverage a library of interactive charts to elevate their financial reporting. The intuitive visualizations, connected to various data sources, reduce maintenance efforts and provide clearer insights.
  • Seamless Collaboration: Anaplan XL Reporting automates report distribution, making it easy to share Excel-developed reports and dashboards with stakeholders on web and mobile devices.
  • Quick Adoption: With a low learning curve and a familiar Excel environment, teams can quickly achieve value and focus on higher-value, strategic activities.

Anaplan XL Reporting is built on a foundation of robust features that allow users to create interactive, finance-owned reports for any business audience.

  • Connectivity and Security: The tool uses industry-standard drivers and APIs to connect to a variety of data sources, including OLAP, relational, and cloud platforms, all while leveraging the security of the underlying data platform.
  • Ad-Hoc Analysis: Users can explore data with interactive drilling, slice-and-dice analysis, and intuitive user calculations.
  • Custom Reporting and Dashboards: Finance teams can create and maintain highly formatted custom reports and dashboards with full control over the layout.
  • Report Across Multiple Sources: The platform allows for reporting across different data assets, providing a coherent, single-page view of the business.
  • Advanced Flexibility: The tool supports a range of reporting needs, from interactive grids to formula-based reports and pre-defined templates.
  • Web Sharing and Automation: Reports can be published to the web for browser and mobile users and scheduled for automated delivery in various formats, including PDF, Excel, or PowerPoint.
  • IBCS Certification: Anaplan XL Reporting is certified by the International Business Communication Standards (IBCS), ensuring reports adhere to the highest global standards for clarity and visual design.

Key Takeaways 

Anaplan Financial Solutions provide a powerful, unified platform that streamlines complex financial processes, helping organizations stay agile in a rapidly changing financial landscape. The suite includes three core components: Financial Consolidation, Disclosure Management, and XL Reporting. Together, these solutions offer a cohesive approach to financial planning and reporting, addressing common challenges like fragmented systems, slow reporting cycles, and compliance risks.

The Anaplan IFRS Accelerator simplifies financial consolidation, a traditionally complex and time-intensive task for teams operating across multiple entities and jurisdictions. It automates the elimination of intercompany transactions, reducing manual errors and saving time. This solution provides a standardized and auditable process for data collection, consolidation, and reporting, ensuring transparency from the general ledger to the final report.

Anaplan's Disclosure Management and XL Reporting applications enhance financial reporting and analysis. Disclosure Management is a secure, next-generation solution that helps teams create high-quality, compliant statutory reports by eliminating inefficiencies and ensuring data accuracy. It operates within the familiar Microsoft Office environment, giving Finance teams full control without needing IT support. Meanwhile, Anaplan XL Reporting supercharges ad-hoc analysis by extending data-connected Excel, providing a no-code solution for real-time reporting, enhanced governance, and seamless collaboration.

Looking to invest in Anaplan’s suite of Financial Consolidation & Reporting software solutions? Get in touch

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